Low-Fat Strawberry Cheesecake Bars

Originally posted on May 16, 2013

For this Mother’s Day, Nate and I were in charge of setting up dinner.  We had just gotten off of a 10-day juicing fast, so we wanted to make something healthy and relatively light – we decided on a Cobb Salad and Loaded Baked Potato entree.  However, being the baker I am, I wanted to find a healthy alternative to a normally decadent dessert for my mom to enjoy.

I found this recipe on http://www.dealwisemommy.net, and made a few changes to make it my own – hope you enjoy!

- Britt

Ingredients:

• Non-stick cooking spray
• 1 cup crushed graham cracker crumbs
• 3 tbsp light butter, softened
• 8 oz package reduced fat cream cheese, softened
• 1/4 cup Splenda
• 1/2 tsp Mexican Vanilla extract
• 6 oz. fat-free vanilla Greek yogurt (I used Oikos)
• 2 large egg whites
• 1 1/2 tbsp lemon juice
• 1 tbsp flour
• 1/4 cup sugar-free strawberry jam.

Directions:

1. Heat oven to 350 degrees.  Coat an 8-inch square baking pan with non-stick spray (or canola oil if preferred).
2. Mix together graham cracker crumbs and butter with a fork until moistened.  Press mixture evenly into bottom of prepared pan.
3. Gently beat cream cheese, sugar, and vanilla extract until smooth using an electric mixer.  Slowly beat in yogurt, egg whites, lemon juice, and flour.   Pour over graham cracker crust.
4. Stir jam until smooth.  Drop by small spoonfuls over surface of cream cheese filling.  Using a butter knife, gently swirl jam through cream cheese filling.
5. Bake for 25 to 30 minutes, or until center is almost set.  Cool to room temperature.  Chill for a few hours before serving.

Tips:

• I made my cheesecake with 2 tbsps of lemon juice, but found it to be quite tart.  I would suggest limiting the lemon juice to a lower amount to have the bars come out slightly sweeter.

• Another suggestion to sweeten the cake more without adding too many additional calories would be to add 1 cup of prepared Dream Whip (made with skim milk).  Fold into the cream cheese mixture before pouring over graham cracker crust.  Adds about 14 calories per bar.

Makes 9 bars.

Calories per bar: 144      vs.

Calories in 1 slice of Cheesecake Factory Strawberry Cheesecake: 730 Calories!!!