Key lime cottage cheese pie cups
25 min · 21 g protein · 174 cals / serving
Everything you want from key lime pie, in a glass: a buttery toasted graham crumb on the bottom and a sharp, creamy lime filling made from blended cottage cheese, lots of zest and fresh lime juice, set just enough with a little gelatine to cut with a spoon like the real thing.
Ingredients
- 2 full sheets graham crackers
- 1 1/2 tsp butter, melted
- 2 tbsp water, cold
- 1 1/2 tsp gelatin, unflavoured powder
- 2 cups cottage cheese (1%), 1 % milkfat
- 1 1/2 tbsp casein protein powder, vanilla or unflavoured
- 1/4 cup fat free cream cheese
- 2 tsp honey
- 1/4 tsp + 1 pinch stevia, pure stevia powder, or to taste
- 2 limes, zest only limes, finely grated zest
- 1/4 cup lime juice, fresh, from the zested limes and 1–2 more; key limes if you can find them
- 1 pinch salt
Steps
- Crush the graham crackers to fine crumbs in a bag with a rolling pin, mix with the melted butter and toast in a dry frying pan over medium heat for 3–4 minutes, stirring, until fragrant and a shade darker. Let cool, then press 3/4 of the crumbs into the bottom of 4 glasses.
- Put the cold water in a small cup, sprinkle the gelatine over and leave 5 minutes to swell. Microwave 10–15 seconds, until fully liquid, not boiling.
- Blend the cottage cheese, casein, cream cheese, honey, stevia, lime zest, lime juice and salt for a full minute, until completely smooth. Stir 3 tablespoons of the filling into the warm gelatine first, so it does not seize into threads when it meets the cold cheese, then pour that into the blender with the motor running and blend 10 seconds more.
- Pour the filling over the crumbs straight away, before the gelatine starts to set. Cover and chill at least 3 hours, until softly set. Scatter the last crumbs and a little extra zest on top to serve.
Good to know
Will it set without gelatine?
It thickens in the fridge but stays a soft, spoonable cream. The 1 1/2 teaspoons give a clean, sliceable spoonful like a no-bake pie. To make one pie to cut into wedges, use 2 1/2 teaspoons and set it over the crumb in a 7 inch pie dish.
Vegetarian?
Gelatine is not. Use 1/2 tsp agar powder instead. Let the blended filling come to room temperature first (agar sets the moment it cools, so cold cheese makes lumps), boil the agar in 100 ml of water for a full minute, blend it in while it is still hot, and pour into the glasses at once.
Can I use bottled lime juice?
Fresh is much brighter, and the zest carries most of the flavour, so do not skip that part. Bottled key lime juice is fine if you still use the zest of two ordinary limes.
Per
- Calories
- 104
- Protein
- (48%)
- 12 g
- Fat
- (19%)
- 2 g
- Carbohydrates
- (33%)
- 9 g
- of which sugar
- 5 g
- Fiber
- <1 g
- Sodium
- 404 mg
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Computed from the ingredients with our published formula, not yet kitchen-tested. General guidance, not medical advice. Talk to your prescriber. How
As written, 696 kcal goes into the pot and 678 g of ingredients comes out as about 670 g of food: 104 kcal per 100 g. Cooking moves water and energy density is the score's biggest lever, so the dish is scored as cooked, not as an average of its parts. Every ingredient links to its food page, with the same data and score. The label's percentages are each macronutrient's share of the calories. The full formula.