Strawberry Cream Cheese Cookies

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Not every Valentine’s Day treat has to be heavy and laden with chocolate. These strawberry lime sugar cookie tarts are light, fresh, and easy to make. I dare you to stop at just one!

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Strawberry cream cheese cookies are a sweet treat that is perfect any day of the year. Get ready to make the easiest dessert, ever.

Whether it’s for a potluck or an easy afternoon snack, you really can’t go wrong with a cookie recipe.

And if you’ve ever had the pleasure of biting into a slice of the classic potluck dessert fondly known as “fruit pizza”, then this is the dessert for you.

Think of these strawberry cookie tarts as mini fruit pizzas.

They’re chewy and fresh. Sweet, but not too sweet.

And the best part is that you can shove 2 or 3 of these “pizzas” into your pie hole and not feel bad about yourself one bit afterward.

High five!

Ingredients you’ll need

This recipe is super simple and cost effective too. The main component is the sugar cookie base.

You can use your favorite sugar cookie recipe, or grab a tube of the slice and bake stuff. I personally prefer a thin, chewy cookie base, but you could use whatever type you like.

Next is a layer of cream cheese flavored with a tinge of vanilla extract. Don’t worry if the cream cheese combo isn’t super sweet. It’ll be offset by the sweetness from sliced strawberries on top, followed by the sugared lime zest.

I love my microplane cube mini box grater for zesting. I can easily zest citrus without making a mess – the case that holds the box grater is transparent, so you can easily see how much zest is inside while you’re working.

(Bonus – it has 3 different sizes of slats so you can easily grate cheese or butter too!)

When you have your lime zested, you’ll toss it with a bit of granulated sugar (the finer the better) to allow the oils from the zest to infuse the sugar. It’s the perfect sweet & tangy topping for these decadent cookie tarts.

These little ditties are inspired by my friend Carmen. She made them for me a few times while I lived with her years ago and I fell in love with them.

The Easiest Dessert, Ever.

It only takes a few simple steps to put together these tasty little tarts. Here’s what to do:

• Bake your sugar cookies on a cookie sheet and allow them to cool completely.
• Spread a generous tablespoon or so of the cream cheese mixture over the cookies. I recommend using an offset spatula like this one from Wilton.

• Sprinkle a pinch of lime zest over the cream cheese.
• Arrange a few strawberry slices on top and garnish with more zest.

That’s it. As simple as can be.

What I love most about these cream cheese cookie tarts is how elegant they look.

In just minutes, you can put together a platter of them for your next brunch or baby shower, and nobody will have any idea just how little effort went into making them.

Other Flavor Combinations to Try

These little fruit pizza cookies are honestly so simple that you could try dozens of other fruit & garnish combinations. Try some of these ideas:

• Blueberries + lemon zest
• Raspberries + orange zest
• Peaches + ground cinnamon
• Blackberries + drizzled white chocolate

Wanna mix it up even further? Replace the cream cheese layer with a honey pecan cream cheese spread.

You could also go the old school route and turn these babies into traditional fruit pizzas, mini style. The possibilities are endless!

Did you try these strawberry cream cheese cookies? Be sure to leave a star rating on the recipe below and let me know what you thought of them in a comment below.