Fat Free Cream Cheese or Regular Cream Cheese

  • I'm a little confused. A lot of the recipes--even for phase 1--say to use FF cream cheese but as I was looking at the label for FF Cream cheese, sugar is listed as the third ingredient. Aren't we supposed to shy away from sugar--especially during Phase 1?

    It is better to use FF cream cheese, whipped cream cheese, or reg cream cheese?
  • The sugar on the label is less than 2% on the label I'm reading. I personally use the 1/3 less fat (Neufchatel) cream cheese. More flavor and no questionable ingredients. I think a lot of the fat free products have additives to improve flavor that I don't want, so I usually use the reduced fat products.
  • I also avoid most of the fat free dairy products for that reason. The exceptions are Cabot fat free cottage cheese and any of the fat free plain yogurt our co-op carries. Fat free yogurt works well in place of sour cream. I use the plain laughing cow for some small amount cream cheese replacement and generally don't use recipes that call for cream cheese in large quantities. I know quite a few people here do use those recipes though so I'm sure you will get lots of suggestions