Cheese!

Okay--2nd post of the night. I'm just realizing how easy this is! I made this cheese ball tonight for a progressive dinner for our church's youth group. As I was enjoying it, my mind went down memory lane. When I was growing up, one of my favorite days of the year was always "Bern Day"--when our entire town of 200 people (and hordes of others, it seemed) had a special day to celebrate our town. Jr. High and High School classes would sponsor a game, or the dunk tank, or make apple fritters,... It was great fun. In my opinion, the very best place to go on Bern Day was to my dad's cheese booth. (He was a dairy farmer, by the way.) It was actually the City Hall-he went all out, with fun games for people to play, a life-sized inflatable cow, cartons and cartons of milk, and every kind of cheese you could imagine--I don't know if you can possibly imagine just HOW MUCH cheese we went through! We usually had several different cheese balls, but this has always been my favorite. I like it best served with white corn tortilla chips, but crackers are great with it, too. (We sometimes gave this to our teachers for Christmas--kinda nice change from the sweets, though it's loaded with fat!) It's super easy, but here's the recipe:

(I double it for a large group)
1 8-oz pkg softened cream cheese
1/2 cup softened butter
2 Tbsp mayo
1 cup crushed pecans
1/4-1/2 tsp garlic salt (to taste)
paprika and parsley flakes to garnish (optional)

Mix cream cheese, butter and mayo together. Add in 1/4 cup pecans. Add garlic salt to taste. Use plastic wrap to shape into a ball. Refrigerate several hours. When firm, unwrap and sprinkle with paprika and parsley flakes. Roll in remaining pecans and enjoy!