Bruschetta Dip

 Homegrown tomatoes are probably one of my favorite things in the whole world. I frequently say "I could eat a whole acre of fresh tomatoes." I have never tried it, but it's probably true.

Knowing this you could only imagine my delight when I got a huge bag of tomatoes from my parent’s sweet neighbors. 

The whole way home I imagined all the yummy things these tomatoes could be transformed into. In my mind I saw myself grilling perfectly sliced French bread, slathering each one with garlic infused oil and topping them perfectly with a delicious tomato mixture. 

Fast forward to 20 minutes before a gaggle of girls descends upon my apartment.  My vision was a bit more appropriate for a summer in Tuscany than real life.  There was no time to grill or slather bread, but I couldn’t pass up the chance on using those shiny, ruby spheres of joy. 

As I chopped the tomatoes, I remembered a delightful brick of cream cheese in my fridge just begging to be used. One of my favorite appetizers is spreading jalapeno jelly over cream cheese and serving it up with a few crackers. I figured this whole concept could be applied to the tomatoes. Luckily I had a good cracker to serve these with as well. It was crazy delicious! The ladies loved it and so did I. So much so I even made more to for lunch the next day.

Ingredients

6 average sized tomatoes, diced

1/2 teaspoon salt and pepper

1/3 cup Italian Salad Dressing

1 tablespoon chopped basil

1 8oz brick cream cheese, softened

assorted crackers (I used Rosemary and Garlic flavored)

 

Combine all the ingredients before the cream cheese and crackers. Let this sit for about 15 minutes to let the flavors meld. 

If your cream cheese is not room temperature, throw it in your microwave for a minute on defrost and it should be perfectly smushy. Once it's the perfect temperature, put it into a pretty serving dish that is deep enough to house all that delicious tomato mixture.

 

Pour the tomatoe mixture over the cream cheese and serve this with crackers. I really loved this at room temperature or slightly chilled. Try this out, you will love it!