You Can Use The Laughing Cow Cheese To Frost Cakes. Here's How
Laughing Cow cheese, maker of those cute little wedges that are instantly recognizable due to the hee-hawing heifer on the package, is set to celebrate their centennial in an unexpected way. Game-changing anniversaries seem to be a trend of late, what with Cadbury Creme Eggs celebrating their 50th by partnering with a brewery. While the fromage formerly known as La Vache Qui Rit isn't going this route (as far as we know, cheese-flavored beer isn't yet a thing), they are instead partnering with a bakery to produce their own birthday cake (via Laughing Cow).
Oh, so it's a cheesecake? That wouldn't be so weird, not really. Laughing Cow is actually kind of cream cheese-ish, after all, and there's even a recipe for prison cheesecake involving this ingredient as it's more likely to be stocked in prison commissaries than blocks of cream cheese are. But no, cheesecake, it seems, wasn't festive enough for Laughing Cow. Instead, they went with a red velvet cake that made use of their product to create its creamy white frosting.
Details on the official Laughing Cow cake
Intrigued by the thought of such a cake? Well, you could always buy one of the limited edition Laughing Cow cakes directly from Daisy Cakes. According to a statement received by Mashed, these will be available for online sales starting on March 11 at noon EST. The website shows that they are four-layer cakes that should serve from 16 to 20 people. They'll be priced at $19.21 (including shipping and handling) in honor of the year these cheese wedges first hit the market (hence the whole anniversary thing).
That's actually not a bad bargain when you take into consideration the fact that Daisy Cakes' standard red velvet cake of a similar size costs $59.95. Of course, it's still kind of a pricey way to conduct an experiment into the possibilities of Laughing Cow as a frosting ingredient if you're unconvinced it will be successful. If you'd rather use the cheese to frost your cake at home, we've investigated the possibilities of a DIY version.
How to make your own Laughing Cow frosting
If you would like a straight-up cream cheese-type frosting of the kind typically used on red velvet cake and carrot cake, you're going to want to go with the plain, original version of Laughing Cow. According to a recipe on Food.com, you'll mix two wedges of the cheese with half a cup (one stick) of softened butter, four cups of powdered sugar, a teaspoon of vanilla extract, 2 tablespoons of milk, and a tablespoon of buttermilk to get that little bit of extra cream cheese tang. If you have no buttermilk and don't feel like mixing up a vinegar/milk substitute for a single tablespoon, just use plan milk instead. Your frosting will be a tad less tangy, but still very tasty.
As to why you might want to make such a frosting instead of using cream cheese, well, apart from the fun of experimenting, the recipe developer noted that cream cheese contains xanthan gum, something to which they have an allergy. Laughing Cow, on the other hand, is xanthan-free, and tends to cost less than the equally xanthan-less mascarpone.
Laughing Cow frosting variant versions
While the original Laughing Cow is the best one-on-one substitute for cream cheese, the Laughing Cow brand has, over the past century, branched out into offering a number of different flavors. One of their newer ones is something that readily adapts to dessert-type applications: a strawberry-flavored cream cheese spread. Spark People has a small-batch recipe (enough to frost two cupcakes, the developer says) calling for two wedges of this cheese mixed with powdered sugar and vanilla.
Food and fitness blog Run Eat Repeat has a frosting recipe that's a little more out there — this one makes use of Laughing Cow Swiss-style cheese wedges (no, they don't have holes). The recipe calls for two wedges of this cheese along with a teaspoon and a half of brown sugar, a heavy dash of cinnamon, and a not-so-heavy dash of salt. The directions simply say: "Mix. Microwave. Put on everything," but the blogger says they themselves used it on a batch of apple muffins.
Laughing Cow's current lineup of cheese wedges includes flavors such as garlic and herb, white cheddar, pepper jack, asiago, and cheddar bacon, none of which seems to lend itself well to topping cakes or muffins (via Laughing Cow). One thing you could do with these, however, is to use them to "frost" a batch of biscuits or cheese scones or even make a filling for savory cookies.