Strawberry Cream Cheese Pretzel Salad

This Strawberry Cream Cheese Pretzel Salad is probably the best “salad” you’ll ever eat.

Whoever managed to call this stuff a salad sure got away with some stuff. I bet that person could talk themselves out of pretty much anything.

Broken vase? Oh no, it’s “abstract art!”..for the floor.

Pushing someone down? No, I was just “helping them with their exercise plan”.

It’s not shoplifting, it’s “making room for new merchandise”.

I didn’t scratch that guy’s car with my cart…I just “detailed it.”

It’s all in the way you frame it.

And if we can get away with framing this dessert as a “salad,” let’s go for it.

Because that means it counts as a meal…or appetizer. Right? Right?

This dessert is one of the Mr.’s all time favorites. He always had it at family gatherings and cookouts growing up. It’s a three layer wonder with a pretzel crust, sweet cream cheese filling, and strawberry jello on top. It’s sweet and salty, which in my life means it’s totally addictive and needs to be removed from my presence before I have to buy all new jeans.

There are about as many recipes for this online as there are annoying pop up ads. I tried one of them awhile back and wasn’t very impressed with the results, so I tweaked the recipe and came up with a version that I think is truly stellar.

My secret? An extra block of cream cheese in the filling. Because well, more cream cheese is never a bad decision.

Like the other cookout desserts from this week, this recipe can be made gluten free by substituting gluten free pretzels for regular gluten-full ones.

If you like cheesecake and strawberries, you’re going to love this dessert. It’s simple to throw together, and other than toasting the pretzel crust for a bit, is completely no bake. The only difficult part is remembering to give yourself enough time to let the jello set. After all, nobody likes liquid jello. Just, no.

This dessert went straight to a work gathering, and there were no leftovers, so I didn’t get any pics of the insides of this “salad.” You’re just going to have trust me on this one. Take my word, this is probably the best salad you’ll ever eat.