Puff Pastry Tomato and Goat Cheese Pizzettes

These puff pastry tomato and goat cheese pizzettes are little flavorful two-inch rounds of tasty deliciousness. 

These little puff pastry tomato and goat cheese pizzettes are only about two inches across, are super light, and are wonderful as appetizers.

Mixed Greens, Peach, and Corn Salad with Balsamic Maple Vinaigrette

This mixed green salad with peaches, corn, spicy pecans, and goat cheese is perfect for fresh peach season.

After assembling this mixed green salad with peaches, drizzle it with a delicious homemade balsamic maple vinaigrette. The sweet and tart dressing combines with the juicy sweet peaches and the soft goat cheese for a salad that you will serve all summer long.

Italian Style Chicken Club Sandwiches with Pane al Latte

This Italian Style Chicken Club Sandwich, made with homemade no knead Pane al Latte (Milk Bread), is pretty much the most delicious chicken sandwich I've ever tasted.

This Italian Style Chicken Club Sandwich is pretty much a knock your socks off delicious sandwich. I know it's my new favorite. While you probably won't find a triple-decker club sandwiches in Italy, it's fun to imagine that if there were one, it might be just like this sandwich.

Asparagus and Goat Cheese Tart

This asparagus and goat cheese tart is the perfect lunch, or when cut into smaller pieces, a delicious party appetizer.

With a store bought puff pastry shell, this asparagus and goat cheese tart is easy to assemble and bake, yet it looks so elegant.

Caramelized Onion, Goat Cheese, and Balsamic Tartlets

These little tartlets are comprised of a combination of pretty amazing ingredients: Caramelized onion jam. Goat cheese. Puff pastry, Balsamic syrup. Thyme. Seriously good. While they are fabulous as an appetizer or part of a lunch paired with a great salad, I've actually reheated the leftovers for breakfast. 

This recipe makes 4 four-inch rounds, but I am thinking that it would also work scaled down to mini appetizers or even baked in a mini muffin tin.

Caramelized Onion, Goat Cheese, and Balsamic Tartlet Recipe

Adapted from the gorgeously photographed and exquisite What Katie Ate. 

Ingredients

1/2 C balsamic vinegar

2 T brown sugar

1 sheet of puff pastry, thawed

1 egg yolk, beaten with a bit of milk

6 to 8 T caramelized onion jam (from this post) 

4 slices of goat cheese, about 1/2 to 3/4 inch thick

Thyme leaves from about 4 sprigs

Freshly ground black pepper

Instructions

1. Prepare the balsamic vinegar syrup: Simmer the vinegar in a small saucepan until it has been reduced by half. Add the brown sugar and simmer until you have syrup that coats a spoon. Cool and refrigerate to thicken. 
2. Preheat the oven to 425 degrees F.
3. Cut the puff pastry into four 4-inch rounds and place them on a parchment lined baking sheet. 
4. Using a 2 1/2 inch cookie cutter, cut 1/2 way through the rounds, creating a 1 inch border. Do not cut all of the way through. 
5. Pierce the center of the rounds (inside the 2 1/2 inch border) several times with a fork. 
6. Brush the outer 1 inch with the egg yolk.
7. Spread the onion jam in the middle of the pastry inside the cut border.
8. Top the center with a goat cheese round and sprinkle with thyme leaves and black pepper. 
9. Bake for 20 to 22 minutes, until golden and puffy. 
10. Drizzle with the balsamic syrup.

Enjoy!

Savory Brioche Pockets | Tuesdays with Dorie

This week the Tuesdays with Dorie group is baking Savory Brioche Pockets from page 421 of Baking with Julia, a book edited by Dorie Greenspan, and based on the PBS series, Baking with Julia (Child).

These brioche bread pockets contain a mixture of mashed red potatoes, goat cheese, chives, caramelized onions, and asparagus tips... a pretty amazing combination of flavors. They are topped with an egg wash, poppy seeds, and a sage leaf. Just to make them pretty. They are supposed to have this little rim around the edge and look like little pies. but my brioche had such great oven spring and ended up looking like dinner rolls. The contributing editor, Nancy Silverton (one of my idols... seriously, read her prose about bread baking in her book.. you will be hooked), suggests that these could be served as appetizers, but I had just one for dinner and it was quite filling.

Making these is pretty involved. First, you have to make the brioche dough and then allow it to ferment over night in the refrigerator. Oh yeah, and there's 30 minutes (thirty minutes!) of high speed kneading in your stand mixer.

After you make and chill the dough, you steam and mash the potatoes, par-cook the asparagus, and caramelize the onions.  Thankfully, once you shape the rolls, you can freeze them and bake them when you need them.

Verdict?

This brioche is the best I have ever tasted/made. Wow. I had some trouble working with it, but it doesn't matter. The texture and taste were perfect. Not heavy, not greasy, but light and airy despite the high butter content. I never understood the appeal of brioche hamburger buns... now I get it. I can't wait to try the portion of the dough that is in the freezer to make them.

What did I do differently from the original recipe? Not much. I nuked the the red potatoes without peeling them ( I used minis) and mashed the skins into the mix of potatoes and goat cheese, and I used the entire trimmed asparagus spear (the recipe calls for just the tips).

To see the recipe, visit Loaves and Stitches.  To see how other Tuesdays with Dorie bloggers fared (and to see their creativity with the recipe) visit the Tuesdays with Dorie site.