Tasty Recipes for the Home Cook

Dessert Light and Healthy

Vanilla Frosting Surprise (Healthy Secret Ingredient)

You can make frosting with cottage cheese. It’s smooth, creamy, and much healthier than traditional vanilla frosting. 

Vanilla Frosting Surprise (Healthy Secret Ingredient)
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There is a secret ingredient in this frosting that I did not want to give away by putting it in the title. I wanted you to see a photo first to show you that this ingredient makes perfect sense as a dessert item.  As you can see, there is nothing unusual looking about this frosting—and there lies the beauty in it. For, my dear friends, the hidden ingredient IS (drumroll please)………..cottage cheese! Yep!.. the one and only, the white stuff with lots of curdles that we are all familiar with! And let me tell you, this frosting tastes NOTHING like cottage cheese. 


I personally think this healthy, nutritious, and an under-utilized cheese has so much more potential than to be eaten on celery sticks, with crackers, or as a ricotta substitute in lasagnas. When I came up the the idea to puree cottage cheese into a smooth and creamy consistency, a whole new world of possibilities opened up. Cottage cheese as a dessert item? Yes! It works wonderfully…and with benefits! It adds protein without the extra fats and calories of cream cheese, mascarpone, butter, or sour cream. Today, I am going to show you how to transform cottage cheese into vanilla frosting that is low calorie, low-fat and reduced sugar.

Transforming the lumpy cottage cheese into a smooth, creamy filling is very attainable. It took me six test batches to get it right. Ironically enough, my first batch was pretty much spot-on and needed only minor tweaking. Batches two through five had variations and yielded unsuccessful results—too lumpy, too watery, too yucky…too happy, too sneezy, too dopey…

Sorry, I drifted off for a second.

Vanilla Frosting Surprise (Healthy Secret Ingredient)

Anyway, I quickly learned some key things during the development of this frosting. I found out that under pureeing the cottage cheese produces a frosting that is firm and holds its shape, but it is granular. On the flip side, blending the cheese into a creamy and smooth consistency produces a thinner, somewhat runny end result. What seems to be happen in this instance, is as the cottage cheese is pureed more and more, the water content is extracted out of the solids and thins out the cheese. I tried pressing out the liquid through a fine mesh strainer prior to pureeing it in hopes of obtaining a thicker consistency. What resulted after blending was a thick cream with very granular bits. I could not puree it enough to smooth it out! The lesson learned here was not to squeeze the water out of the cheese.

Vanilla Frosting Surprise (Healthy Secret Ingredient)

So far, I have created cottage cheese that is smooth and creamy. It now needs to be firmed up. This is achieved by adding a small amount of Neufchâtel cheese and cornstarch. The former firms up the frosting without making it taste cream cheesy and the latter absorbs any liquid. For flavoring, vanilla extract is added. Finally, to add sweetness, I use a combination of powdered sugar and Stevia White Powder (my personal favorite sweetener that can purchase online or health food stores). There is just enough sweetener to make the frosting sweet without being overly so. Once you start playing around with the recipe, you can adjust the sweetness to suit your taste.

There you have it, cottage cheese frosting! Follow the directions, keep the tips in mind, and you will end up with cottage cheese frosting that is the consistency of whipped cream frosting. Get started by using it to decorate your cakes, cupcakes, any other baked goods. I hope you try it out. Come back later this week,  and I will show you what I am going to do with it!


Vanilla Frosting Surprise (Healthy Secret Ingredient)

Recipe Update:

It is recommended to eat cornstarch raw. It is best to pasteurize it before using in the recipe. To do so, place cornstarch in a small microwaveable bowl, like a dipping bow. Cover and microwave at 30 second intervals for 3 to 4 repetitions or until an instant read thermometer registers 165° F.


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Vanilla Frosting Surprise ( Healthy Secret Ingredient)

Difficulty:BeginnerPrep time: 8 minutesCook time: 2 minutesRest time:1 hour Total time:1 hour 10 minutesServings:2 Cups

Description

You can make frosting with cottage cheese. It’s smooth, creamy, and much healthier than traditional vanilla frosting. 

Ingredients

Instructions

    Pasteurize cornstarch:

  1. Eating cornstarch raw is not recommended. Pasteurize cornstarch prior to use. To ensure you end up with enough cornstarch, pasteurize more than needed for the recipe.
  2. Place cornstarch in a small microwaveable bowl, such as a dipping bow. Cover and microwave at 30 second intervals for 3 to 4 repetitions or until an instant read thermometer registers 165° F.
  3. To make frosting:

  4. If there are obvious pools of water in the cottage cheese, you may pour out the excess, but don’t press to drain out liquid. Place cottage cheese into a blender and puree until at least 90% smooth. See picture below.
    Vanilla Frosting Surprise (Healthy Secret Ingredient)
  5. You might need to stop the blender a few times to scrape and stir to ensure that everything is pureed. Add the remaining ingredients. Puree until smooth and creamy, stopping to scrape, if needed. Frosting will be smooth and somewhat runny. Refrigerate in a shallow container (more surface area to expedite chilling) for at least 1 hour to firm up, longer is better. Store refrigerated.
  6. Makes about 2 1/4 cups. 

Note

  • To minimize the amount sugar, use no salt added cottage cheese…if you can find it. You can reduce the sweetener slightly if using the no salt version. Although, as far as I can tell, it is not that widely available.
  • If you’re using a sweetener other than Stevia, adjust the amount to taste.
Keywords:Vanilla Frosting, Healthy Vanilla Frosting, Cottage Cheese Frosting, Secret Ingredient, Secret Frosting Frosting

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15 Comments

  1. That looks lovely and creamy, wonderful! Thanks for linking up to Sweet and Savoury Sunday, stop by and link up again. Have a great day!!

  2. Thanks, Laura. I definitely feel less guilty eating this frosting.

  3. Oh Yum, this looks so good! Hope you are having a great week and thanks so much for sharing your awesome talent with Full Plate Thursday.
    Come Back Soon!
    Miz Helen

  4. Thank you, Miz Helen. It's really worth a try!

  5. Thank you so much for the Vanilla Frosting Surprise.It looks Delicious.I am very glad to here and thanks so much for sharing the recipe also I am definitely going to make this recipe.I definitely feel happy to eating this frosting.

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  13. I’m going to sneak in a bit of vanilla protein powder to replace the corn starch and vanilla extract. The only way I can get my XC teen to get enough protein is sneak it in dessert. Protein powder+ cottage cheese makes my protein seeking heart happy.

    1. Protein powder sounds like a great idea!! I’d love to know how it turns out if you make it! 🙂

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