Get Lemon Cream Cheese Bars With Half The Work Using A Simple Cheat

Is there any flavor combination more decadently refreshing than tart lemons and silky cream? Perhaps, but this pairing certainly warrants a seat near the top of the list. Lemons' sour freshness cuts through the craveable density of things like cream cheese to create a beautiful balance of tangy richness. Though lemon cheesecake may be the most obvious way to showcase these flavors together, cooking your cheesecake in a water bath can be a finicky, time-consuming process when you're trying to quell a craving.

A simpler alternative that's easier but just as tasty may be lemon cream cheese bars. While classic recipes include instructions for making a shortbread dough crust, a simple swap nixes this step so you can enjoy your dessert even faster. Instead of painstakingly mixing and par-baking the lowest layer, use store-bought crescent dough. This might seem like a risky swap, but crescent dough makes a delicious crust for mini cherry pies among dozens of other uses for this stretchy, familiar pastry in its classic poppable can.

With this hack, there's no need to par-bake anything or whisk together a streusel topping. Instead, a simple lemony cream cheese mixture is sandwiched between two layers of raw crescent dough in a baking dish before crisping to perfection in the oven. A thin layer of sugar and melted butter brushed over the top layer of crescent dough forms a thin, crackly crust that adds the perfect amount of sweetness and texture that's a perfect stand-in for streusel.

Using crescent roll dough in place of homemade crust and streusel makes this recipe so simple that it's also incredibly easy to customize. However, it's important to get the basics down before you experiment — knowing how to prevent sticky crescent roll dough and ensuring your cream cheese comes to room temperature to make it soft and pliable will go a long way toward ensuring you can always pull this dessert off without a hitch.

The first and most obvious way to make this recipe your own is by skipping the lemon entirely in favor of another citrus flavor. Key limes (or even regular limes) are the perfect choice, as they offer a floral tanginess similar to lemons, but are just different enough to feel special. To really bring the key lime flavors home, sprinkle a little cinnamon into the butter and sugar mixture that's brushed on the top layer. Since key lime pie is typically served in a graham cracker crust, a touch of cinnamon will bring some of that graham cracker-like flavor to the dessert.

While you'll also likely see success with other citrus fruits like tangerines and blood oranges, there's also the temptation to experiment with a range of other fruit flavors. If you choose to do this, try using extracts or simple syrups and just add a little of them to your recipe, as using whole raw or cooked pieces of fruit may make your filling watery.