Puff Pastry - A Tea Party Friend!

I had a dessert tea party on Friday evening. A dessert tea is a low-stress way to host a tea party, because all I have to make is a dessert (not three full courses) and I can focus on enjoying my friends' company instead of running around serving. I could even purchase the dessert (which I have done before!). These dessert teas work really well for me as evening teas, because they're easy to carry off after a full day of work.

At this recent tea, I used puff pastry to make a sinfully delicious and incredibly simple dessert. The recipe is from my former boss (thanks, J!). It never fails to impress and I could eat it all day long!

I don't have a photo, but the apple puffs below give a similar sense of the thing.

1 - Thaw one sheet of puff pastry, according to directions. Preheat oven to 350.

2 - Roll out the pastry so that the creases are worked together and the pastry is a little thinner.

3 - Cut into 4 sections.

4 - Add to the center of each section about 1 tablespoon each of chocolate chips and walnuts (or whatever nut you choose).

5 - Seal up the puff pastry around the choc/nuts by making a pyramid and sealing the seams.

6 - Place in container to bake (I use an oversized muffin tin).

7 - Bake for ~20-25 minutes. Puff pastry should be golden brown on top.

8 - Serve warm with a scoop of ice cream. YUM!

At the tea, my friends and I were talking about what else we could do with puff pastry. One friend suggested using apples, and I tried that yesterday. It was great! I chopped up apples and walnuts, added spices (cinnamon, allspice, nutmeg, ginger) and just a dash of honey.

For a savory variation, I cut cherry tomatoes in quarters and added them into a small puff pocket with a bit of herbed goat cheese. Oh, wow - these were good!

Puff pastry is an incredibly flexible tool. I love it because it allows me to create very fast, yet delicious and fancy treats. See this post for another way I've used puff pastry. I find it in the freezer section at my grocery store, next to the frozen pies and cakes.