ILP: CREAM CHEESE [CAKE] MINTS

When I was younger, I can remember attending the weddings of my aunts and uncles, close family, and friends, and eating those cute little cream cheese mints that were meant to accompany the cake until I was morbidly sick to my stomach.  It was as if for every mint I ate, my taste buds demanded five more.  You could say that I liked them quite a bit.

Even though they are not directly cake or cookies themselves, I thought that this would be an appropriate ILP topic since they are a yummy treat that is very often served alongside cakes at weddings and other fancy parties.  It had been quite a while since the last time I had these sweet treats, so I was anxious and excited to get started this week!!

The idea for making this my ILP learning project this week came from a video of these mints that I saw on Facebook.  While this gave me the ingredients that I would need, it did not give any of the exact amounts, so I needed to do a little bit of ‘guestimating’ along the way.  This actually turned out to be one of the most helpful parts of this experience, as it forced me to analyze what I had in front of me, make adjustments, and then learn as I went along.

The first step in making these cream cheese mints was to gather all of the ingredients and supplies that I would be needing.  These included one package of cream cheese, two tablespoons of butter, powdered sugar, mint extract, food coloring, four medium sized mixing bowls, one large mixing bowl, four mixing spoons, and some foil.

Once I had everything assembled, I began by mixing the softened cream cheese and butter in the large mixing bowl. Once they were blended, I added the mint extract and the first portion of powered sugar.  As I was mixing, I noticed that the texture was nowhere near what it needed to be yet.  I continued adding powdered sugar and mixing it in until I was left with a more stiff and pasty mixture.

Once I had the consistency that I wanted, I divided the mixture into four separate bowls and added three drops of food coloring into each one.  Then, using a spoon, I rolled the mixture into small balls and coated the outsides with powdered sugar before placing them on the foil to sit.  When all of the mints were rolled into balls, I then went through with a fork and pressed into the tops of each mint to flatten them and create a simple design.  Even though these mints can be made into fancier shapes using molds, I think these simple ones turned out just as well! They were definitely just as tasty!