Life of the Party- Strawberry Pudding

This dish, is a hit at any party, cook out, or pot luck that I bring it to. It is such a simple and easy dish to prepare, and it will be gone faster than it takes to make it. I got the original recipe from my mother, but tweaked it in my own way, where I swapped out the use of sour cream in my mother's recipe for cream cheese and sweetened condensed milk. In which gives the pudding mix a taste and consistency of cake batter, and who doesn't love the taste of cake batter.

The concept is similar to your normal Banana Pudding, where you layer your cookies, pudding and fruit and repeat. I use the typical Nilla Wafers as the cookies, and I choose to cook my strawberries instead of just cutting up fresh strawberries. Speaking of strawberries you can use fresh or frozen, I normally go with frozen because I do not like to get a pack of berries and there are some bad berries in the pack, I like to use the enter pack for this dish and nothing less. The pudding mix, as I stated earlier I blend cream cheese with the sweetened condensed milk and then blend a pudding of my choice normally vanilla or cheesecake flavor and milk, and it is in my opinion heaven in a bowl. I haven't ventured out to try any other pudding flavors but hey if you want to be adventurous try a different pudding and let me know how it comes out. Once your strawberries are cooked and pudding is set it is time to build, layer the cookies, then pudding, then strawberry and repeat. You should be able to get about two layers, once the pudding is layered top with cool whip or whip cream garnish with some crushed Nilla Wafers and you are all set.

It is such a light and cool dessert, just perfect for the spring and summer. Some people say that Banana Pudding can be addictive, and I believe it is just as addictive just ask my wife. Before I made it she had never even heard of Strawberry Pudding, and now she cannot get enough of it. So go out and give this recipe a try and see how many Strawberry Pudding junkies you can create. Enjoy!!!

Strawberry Pudding

1 large container of Cool Whip

1 box of Nilla Wafers

1 large (8oz) box of Vanilla or Cheesecake Pudding Mix

1 small box of Strawberry Gelatin Mix

1/8 cup of sugar

1 8oz pack of Cream Cheese (room temperature)

1 can of Sweetened Condensed Milk

2 cups of Milk

2 pints of Fresh Strawberries or 2 16 oz packs of Frozen Strawberries

1 13x9 cake pan

1. Slice Strawberries in halves, then place in saucepan with Strawberry Gelatin Mix  and sugar. Allow mix to cook over medium heat and stir constantly until mixture is mixed and strawberries are tender. Set aside
2. While the strawberries are cooking, in a medium mixing bowl combine cream cheese and sweetened condense milk and blend until smooth with little to no lumps. 
3. Next whisk in the Pudding Mix into the Cream Cheese mix until well blended and set it aside. The pudding mix will thicken up once it is set. 
4. Layer in 13x9 cake pan Nilla Wafers, Pudding Mix, Strawberry mix, repeat. Then top with layer of cool whip garnish with crushed Nilla Wafers. 
5. Let sit in refrigerator. Served best while cold.