White Chocolate Cherry Pie

I kind of forgot I had signed up to feed the missionaries for our church for dinner last night. I remembered in plenty of time to cook dinner and all, but I didn't remember until after I did all of the grocery shopping. Now, I always make dessert when we feed the missionaries so I needed to come up with something using ingredients I already had on hand.  I remembered I had a can of cherry pie filling, but one small can of pie filling isn't enough to fill a whole pie. So, I thought about it and  was inspired by a recipe I have sitting around for a cookie pizza that uses sugar cookie dough covered with a layer of cream cheese and a layer of cherry pie filling. So I thought I could make a cherry pie with a layer of cream cheese filling. Perfect, since I have a  french pastry shell recipe that tastes kind of like sugar cookie dough. However, I didn't want a layer of  just plain old cream cheese so I searched the internet for inspiration. This is what I came up with and you don't even have to bake it!

White Chocolate Cherry Pie

• 1 precooked french pastry shell or graham cracker crust
• 8 oz cream cheese or Neufchatel cheese, softened (I usually replace cream cheese with Neufchatel cheese when I cook)
• 1 cup white chocolate chips
• 2 tablespoons milk
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 1 21oz can cherry pie filling

Beat cream cheese with an electric beater for 30 seconds. Melt white chocolate with milk in a double boiler, stirring constantly. When chocolate is mostly melted (with only a few lumps remaining) remove from heat and add vanilla. Stir until chocolate is completely smooth. Add chocolate mixture to cream cheese. Beat with electric mixer until smooth. Spoon mixture into pastry shell. Spread mixture so that it covers the whole bottom of the pie shell and is level. Top with cherry pie filling. Cover and chill for 2 hours before serving. (I think this would also be good with a chocolate cookie crust and semi-sweet chocolate chip instead white chocolate to make a sort of black forest pie) If you use neufchatel cheese and cut into 12 servings, each slice is approx. 366 calories. Cut into 16 servings: each slice 275 calories.