(Makes 6 servings)
- INGREDIENTS
4 ounces / 113 g cream cheese, slightly softened - 1/4 cup / 60 mL sugar
- 1 cup / 250 mL whipping cream
- 4 cups / 1 L cubed angel food cake
- 1 cup / 250 mL cherry pie filling
- 1/2 teaspoon / 2.5 mL almond extract
Whip the cream cheese, sugar, and whipping cream together in a deep bowl with a hand beater until peaks are formed.
Stir in the cubed angel food cake until all cubes are coated with the whipped cream.
In a small bowl, combine the cherry pie filling and the almond extract.
Spoon a little of the cherry pie filling into the bottoms of six individual serving dishes or a large glass bowl. Top the cherry filling with the angel food cake mixture.
Spoon the remaining pie filling over the cake.
The Sweet Experience of Clewiston, Florida
Tracing the Cherry Cream Supreme’s Key Ingredient Back to its Source
The friendly people at the Chamber of Commerce in Clewiston, Florida, set us up for a Sugarland Tour. Clewiston is the hometown of US Sugar, which explains why there is an annual Sugar Festival in the spring to celebrate the end of the sugarcane harvest.
Our driver and tour guide, Hunter, along with Jeff Barwick, from the Chamber, pointed to a mass of dark, distant smoke billowing into the clear blue Florida sky. Suddenly we were on a mission. We raced down farm roads, cut across a field and came to a dusty halt alongside a drainage canal. The huge, deep red, twisting flames ate up the trash, dead leaves, and varmints at the base of the sugar cane plants, making the harvesting process much more efficient.
With a swish of his machete, Jeff produced a bamboo-like stalk of fresh sugarcane. He waved the machete again and again to produce bite-size pieces. “Pop a medallion in your mouth, suck the juice out and you’ll have nothing left but pulp. If you accidentally swallow, don’t worry. You won’t need a laxative in the morning.” Casting caution to the wind, we did what Jeff suggested. The sweet liquid was so good that we did it twice.
At the sugar refinery, it was fascinating to follow the sugar cane through its many processes to become the white crystals familiar to us all. Hunter pointed out that sugar was “the purest product on our grocery shelves. US Sugar uses no chemicals in the refining of its sugars.”
After the tour, we went back to our motorhome at the Clewiston KOA, a friendly, hospitable home base for anyone visiting the area. We created a dessert as good as sugarcane. It makes a welcome addition to any potluck.
Phyllis Hinz & Lamont Mackay are authors of On The Road With The Cooking Ladies, Let’s Get Grilling https://amzn.to/2OSGLbZ and a new series of guidebooks Stratford For All Seasons https://amzn.to/38w4bvu
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