5 Cream Cheese Flavors That Shouldn't Exist

There was once a time when cream cheese was just that: cream cheese, a plain, white cheese intended to be spread on plain, white bagels. Times have changed, however, and today we live in an era of far more abundant cream cheese options, ones that have evolved far beyond the tried-and-true scallion, veggie, and lox spread options. While we welcome most of these new creations, some really leave us scratching our heads. Here are five cream cheeses that went a little too far.

Red Velvet
Spotted in Williamsburg, Brooklyn's Bagel Store, this cream cheese is a garish shade of red, with actual chunks of red velvet cake mixed in. Folks: a bagel should not be a dessert. Repeat: A BAGEL SHOULD NOT BE A DESSERT.

Jalapeño Asiago
Also spotted in Brooklyn, at the Brooklyn Bagel & Coffee Company, this one shouldn't exist for one reason: it contains Asiago, and as we already know, there is no reason for any cheese, especially Asiago (why all bagel makers choose Asiago is beyond us), to go near a bagel except for cream cheese. And please, don't add other cheeses to cream cheese. The jalapeño can stay.

Apple Cinnamon, Blueberry, Strawberry, Peach, etc.
Fruit-flavored cream cheese frosting belongs on cakes, not bagels.

Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough
Found at Tompkins Square Bagels in Manhattan, this is basically the equivalent of spreading cream cheese on a chocolate chip cookie and eating that. Heck, we'd rather just do that than eat this goop.

Cheddar
Found at New York's venerable Ess-a-Bagel, this once again breaks a cardinal rule: The only cheese that should go on a bagel is cream cheese!