Homemade Le Snak packs make a great lunchbox idea for hungry kids. The cheese and chives are the flavour choice in our house.
I mentioned in my last post that during a back-to-school grocery trip, I boycotted a number of convenience snacks. My youngest children are now teenagers, and buying teeny tiny "grab packs" for school is really expensive and just not practical. One of the first things I banned were the Le Snaks!
Comparison of Homemade Le Snak
Le Snak
- Cost: $6.80 for 6 servings - Each serving contains 10g of cheese and 10g of crackers. There is no way this will fill a teenage belly!
- Ingredients: The Le Snak paste contains only 49% cheese; the remaining ingredients include margarine, artificial ingredients, emulsifiers, preservatives, and numbers.
- Nutrition: comparisons using 100g - Fat 23.5g of that saturated fat is 11.6g, Sodium 805mg, Protein 11.1g and Calcium 460mg
It took a little bit of trial and error to develop this recipe because I wanted to make sure the recipe was healthier and tastier than the commercial version. I needed to create a delicious flavour and keep the same cheese consistency the children enjoy. After all, if I was going to win the approval of my kids, the recipe needed to be very good!
I'm happy to say the Thermomix Cheese & Chive Le Snak recipe was a huge win! The kids loved the recipe and have been happy to eat the cheese dip with crackers, carrot sticks and cucumber. My recipe makes 10 x 50gm serves which is 5 school lunches each, for my 2 children.
What If I Don't Have a Thermomix?
Happily, the recipe is suitable for any food processor, Thermomix, Magimix, and Frothie. It was originally tested on the TM5 and has since been retested on the TM6 and multiple other devices.
Step-by-Step Le Snak Recipe
Below is a pictorial step-by-step procedure for making the Cheese and Chives spread in the Thermomix. The full recipe and instructions are in the recipe sheet. The notes explain how to make this spread in your food processor.
Another nice idea is to create individual Cheese & Chive Spread serves in small ramekin dishes for an after-school snack.
Do you like my cute little Babybel cheese creatures pictured above? Although my daughter is in high school, she still loved finding these in her lunchbox. Take a look at the quick Babybel Cheese Art tutorial here.
Don't forget to take a look at all my other fabulous and free lunchbox ideas.
Homemade Le Snak
Equipment
Ingredients
- 250 g tasty cheese block cut in quarters
- 1 chives bunch fresh (cut in quarters)
- 250 g 60% reduced fat Philadelphia Cooking Cream 60% fat free *see note
- 2 teaspoon onion flakes
- 1 teaspoon garlic powder
Instructions
- Place the cheese and chives in TM bowl. Chop 6 sec/Speed 8.250 g tasty cheese, 1 chives
- Add onion flakes, garlic powder and Philly Cooking Cream. Blend 20 sec/Speed 8.250 g 60% reduced fat Philadelphia Cooking Cream, 2 teaspoon onion flakes, 1 teaspoon garlic powder
- Scrape down the bowl. Blend 20 sec/Speed 8.
- Divide the mixture between 10 snack containers.
- Refrigerate until required.
Notes
- Roughly cut chives and cheese by hand and add to the food processor.
- Process until the mixture looks like bread crumbs.
- Add the garlic powder, onion flakes and Philly Cooking Cream.
- Process all the ingredients until smooth.
- Place into serving containers and refrigerate until required.
Log in: Then add your own recipe notes below!
Nutrition
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Thanks For Stopping By!
Thanks so much for stopping by and checking out the website. Please feel free to leave me a comment. I love hearing from everyone 🙂Rating the recipes also lets people know if they should try a recipe.
Happy Cooking xx
Marilyn Newton says
Really want to try this recipe but just wanted to
clarify - in the ingredients it says Cooking Cream then in Instructions it's says Cooking Cheese, is that right? I'm thinking a typo.
Julie Carlyle says
Hi Marilyn
I'm so sorry if that was confusing. The product is Philidelphia Cooking Cream. Its a cross between a cream cheese and cream and it is lower in fat that tradition cream and has more protein and calcium.
I have tried to make it more clear. If you haven't seen the product before, take a look at the step by step photo. The packaging is now light green I believe, but it is still very similar.
I hope this helps.
Julie xx
Clara says
This is a great recipe. How long would you leave in the fridge for? 1 week so 1 a day in lunch boxes? Wondering if it would freeze and could be pulled out the night before??
Julie Carlyle says
Hi Clara
Thank you for your message. I have kept my le snak in the fridge for 10 days without any problems at all.
The little pots that you’re looking at were actually frozen as I didn’t have time to photograph them when I made the batch so I froze half so the kids wouldn’t eat them before I could take pics 🙂 So Yep! Freezing is fine 😊😊
I hope you enjoy the recipe.
Happy Cooking
Julie
Xx