I have a collection of old handmade recipe albums, recipe card boxes and a box full of recipes that I have been collecting for several years. If I see someone’s recipe card collection for sale, I just can’t pass it up. I feel bad that someone’s hard work collecting these recipes is being sold so I buy them and put on my bookshelf. I have recipes from the 20s through about 2005 or so. Some are not vintage but I have no idea what to call them.
Some recipes are written on the backs of envelopes and some are typed out neatly on cards. It’s really a treasure trove of someone’s life in the kitchen. It’s fun to go through them.
I decided that a few times a month, I would pick a recipe, make it, and blog about it. Many of these recipes have no attribution or even a publishing date and are handwritten. If it does have any publishing info, I’ll post it. Except for the box of recipes that I have collected, I have no idea who even belonged to these boxes/albums.
As you can see from the picture, the ingredient list in this recipe ~ Cream Cheese Squares ~ is a mess. Luckily, there aren’t too many ingredients. The recipe looks like it’s from the late 70s or early 80s from a column called Common Sense Cooking by Ruth McDaniel. I did a bing search and it looks like Mrs. McDaniel has passed away.
These cream cheese squares are delicious! They are cheesecake in bar form. The recipe is easy however, saving 1 cup of the base to sprinkle on top is too much. One-half cup would be plenty.
Cream Cheese Squares
1/3 cup butter, room temperature
1/3 cup packed brown sugar
1 cup flour
1/2 cup chopped nuts ~ I used pecans
1 (8 oz) cream cheese, room temperature
1/4 cup sugar
1 egg
1 tbsp fresh lemon juice
2 tsps milk
1/2 tsp vanilla
Preheat oven to 350º.
Cream butter and brown sugar in a medium bowl. Add flour and chopped nuts and mix to make a crumb mixture. Reserve 1/2 cup and set aside. Press remainder in greased, 8-inch square pan. Bake 15 minutes until lightly browned. Let cool while you make the cream cheese mixture.
Blend sugar and cream cheese in a medium bowl with a mixer until smooth. Add egg, milk, lemon juice, and vanilla. Beat well until smooth. Pour over warm crust and sprinkle the reserved crust mixture over the cream cheese mixture. Bake for 25 minutes.
Cool and cut into squares.
I keep them in the refrigerator because I like cheesecake cold but the recipe doesn’t say anything about keeping them there.
Makes 9 bars.
Happy Cooking!