I made my first cheeseball about 15 years ago, when I was trying out some of my grandma’s recipes in the months after she died. It was a hit, not just with relatives on my mom’s side, who appreciated the sentimental connection, but in a couple of other circles as well.
I’m still asked to bring cheeseballs to parties, so naturally I’ve spent some time thinking about how to reduce the cost of a dish that could easily top $10, depending on where and when I bought the ingredients. But this weekend’s cheeseball set a new record in cost-effectiveness, probably because I had to improvise under deadline.
I’m not going to suggest this as a recipe, because it wasn’t the best cheeseball I ever made. But it worked, and here’s the secret: As long as you’ve got a cream cheese base, at least one tangier cheese to mix in, and some garlic powder, it’s pretty hard to screw up.
In this case, I started with the remains of an 8-pounce brick of cream cheese, about 3/4 of a package. I usually stock up on these when they’re priced at $1 or less. I added some swiss almond cheese spread that had been hanging out in the fridge for weeks (maybe even months), and -- sad but true -- a chunk of store brand Velveeta-style cheese. Pressed for time, I forgot to put in the garlic powder. And yet people still ate it.
Total cost? Less than $2.
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