Peace and Love in the Kitchen

These are the perfect little something to serve to your friends over coffee and a visit. You might host a play group for your babies or a meeting at your house. You might take them to the office for your boss’s birthday. You could even make these for your family on a special morning. They taste like you brought them in fresh from a bakery. No one has to know that a four year old could make them. Serve with good strong French coffee.

1. PREP: Preheat oven to 400. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper or spray well with baking spray. Brush each pastry square with some of the glaze. Place one piece of chocolate on the edge of each pastry square. The chocolate should peek out of each end when you roll it up. Roll each square cigar-style so that the chocolate is rolled up tightly inside the pastry. Place the rolled pastries on the baking sheet, seam side down.

2. BAKE: Brush tops of pastry rolls with a little egg glaze and then sprinkle lightly with sugar. Bake until pastries are golden brown, about 15 minutes. Serve warm or at room temperature.

Note: Buy frozen puff pastry made with all butter and no oil. They taste and work much better than the brands with oil. Wholefoods and DuFour makes a good one. Both of these brands only contain one sheet of puff pastry which will make 12 pastries. Buy two packages to make the full recipe.

Note: I used bars of high quality 60% Cacao bittersweet chocolate on half and milk chocolate on the other half. Both were delicious. You could even use chocolate chips.

Note: The pastries can be prepped ahead. Covered with plastic wrap and refrigerated, the pastries will last one day. If you want to freeze them, thaw the frozen pastry just until you can work with it, roll with chocolate, wrap well and freeze. When you want to bake them, apply egg glaze to outside and bake.

FILLING VARIATIONS:
Puff pastry can be rolled with other yummy things besides chocolate. It is nice to make a batch of chocolate and then a batch of another flavor. Here are some ideas for fillings:

Lemon Curd
Almond Paste mixed with Raspberry jam
Granny Smith apples diced and mixed with a little cinnamon, sugar, and fresh lemon juice
Any Jam
Peace and love from my kitchen to yours,
Waverly