peaches

Quick and Easy Peach Puff Pastry Tartlets

/ Jodi / 39 Comments

Quick and Easy Peach Puff Pastry Tartlets.

This Sunday, we had the family over for dinner.  Hubby made the most amazing BBQ spare ribs, which we served with grilled sweet corn on the cob, cowboy baked beans and a caprese salad.  A fresh peach dessert seemed the perfect ending for this BBQ, but I didn’t feel like fussing much.

Knowing I had a package of puff pastry in the freezer, I quickly googled “peaches and puff pastry” and found this wonderful recipe at Natasha’s Kitchen.

These only took about 10 minutes to throw together and 15 minutes to bake for a beautiful and super delicious dessert.

Well – at least that is what I hear…. You’ll have to take my family’s word for how delish they were as I didn’t get to try one.  They’re gone (which is always a good sign).

When your sons ask for a second (or a third), you happily feed them and drink a glass of wine instead <wink>!  I can make these anytime I want again, but feeding my guys and daughter-in-laws and granddaughter and a bestie – – – seeing smiles, hearing yums, and getting hugs – – – well – that’s all this momma needs.

I’m pretty sure I’ll be making these again!  I’m betting sliced apples and walnuts would be a wonderful Autumn version as well as loads of other fruit and nut combinations.

Here’s Natasha’s recipe as I made it.

Quick and Easy Peach Puff Pastry Tartlets

Ingredients:

  • 1 sheet of frozen puff pastry, thawed 20-30 mins.
  • 1 egg
  • 2 large fresh peaches
  • 2 Tbsp sugar
  • 1 Tbsp flour
  • 1/2 tsp cinnamon
  • 1/2 tsp vanilla
  • 1/3 cup sliced almonds
  • 1/2 cup powdered sugar
  • 1 tsp vanilla extract
  • 1 Tbsp milk

Directions:

Preheat oven to 400˚F.

Cut thawed puff pastry into 9 equal sized squares and place on parchment lined baking sheet or baking stone.

Beat egg in a small bowl and set aside.

Slice peaches and place in a medium mixing bowl. Sprinkle with sugar,  flour, cinnamon, and vanilla.  Gently fold together.

Place 3 -4 peach slices in the center of each pastry square. Avoid getting peach juice on pastry edges. Brush edges generously with beaten egg. Sprinkle sliced almonds over pastry and peaches.

Bake at 400˚F for 15-18 minutes or until puffed and golden on the edges.  Remove from oven and let cool on baking sheet for 10 minutes.

While cooling, make the glaze by stirring together powdered sugar, vanilla and milk in a small bowl or measuring cup. Add more milk if needed to reach desired consistency.   Drizzle over cooled tartlets.

Enjoy!

Cheers & Hugs,
Jodi

#Natashaskitchen

Balsamic Grilled Peaches & Chicken Salad Dinner

/ Jodi / 14 Comments

balsamic grilled peaches and chicken 3

Oh Friends… you know how much I love chicken and discovering new and different ways to prepare it.

Well this week I discovered another Winner Winner Chicken Dinner!

It’s simple, it’s fast, it’s healthy, and it’s YUMMY!

balsamic grilled peaches and chicken 2

I have seen and heard about grilling peaches, and I was intrigued.

Having some ripe peaches in the fridge that weren’t getting eaten, now was the time to try it!

grilled peaches

It was so easy, and they were DELISH! 

Balsamic Grilled Peaches and Chicken

If you are looking for another light and simple, but full-flavored summer chicken dinner, look no further!

And remember, like I always say, if you don’t like a particular ingredient, switch it up!  Substitute goat cheese or feta or even shredded cheddar for the blue cheese if you are not a blue cheese fan (but BOO to you because it is DIVINE!).  Change up the greens to ones you prefer.  I used Spring Mix, but it would be awesome with Spinach or Arugula or Kale too!

Be creative.

Have fun!

Make dinner a celebration.

Create art on a plate.

You won’t be sorry about this one!

Balsamic Grilled Peaches & Chicken Salad

Ingredientsbalsamic grilled peaches and chicken 2

  • 4 chicken breast halves
  • 4-6 cups Spring Mix Salad Greens
  • 2 large sweet Vidalia onions, sliced into 1/2 thick slices
  • 4-6 ripe peaches – cut in half and pitted
  • 1/2 cup crumbled blue cheese
  • 1 Bottle Balsamic Vinaigrette Dressing (I used Ken’s Light version)
  • Olive Oil
  • Balsamic Vinegar
  • Salt & Pepper to taste

Directions

  • Marinade chicken breasts in 1/2 bottle balsamic vinagrette for at least 4 hours.
  • Grill chicken when ready to serve.
  • Place Onion Slices in a grill basket (or foil).  Sprinkle with olive oil, salt and pepper.  Grill until translucent and char-grilled.  Place on one side of grill while chicken is grilling on the other side.  These two take about the same amount of time – approximately 20 minutes.
  • Once chicken is done, remove from grill, and set aside.
  • Sprinkle peach halves with olive oil, salt, and balsamic vinegar.  Place cut side done on grill, and grill for about 5-7 minutes until soft and char-grilled.  When done, remove from grill and slice peach halves into three or four pieces.
  • To plate, place a cup of greens on plate, top with grilled onions, peach slices and crumbled blue cheese.  Add chicken to side or slice and mix in with chicken.
  • ENJOY!

Cheers & Hugs,

Jodi

You Know You’re Getting Old When…………………… and Peach Cookie Cobbler

/ Jodi / 7 Comments

peach cobbler cover

You know you are getting old when…………

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So I dialed the number I know by heart.   It’s our Friday evening ritual.

The pleasant voice on the other end of the line asks, “Is this Mrs. M?”

“Why Yes,” I say, with a bit of a startle and a big grin – wondering whether to be flattered or concerned….

“Delivery to Blankety Blank Blank Road?”

“Yes!”    I’m either more excited or more concerned….

And I go about ordering our usual Friday night pizza/salad delivery from our favorite Mars Pizza.

Yep – that’s our Friday night ritual.

And yep – that means we are getting old.

When Friday night is your earliest go to bed night, earliest get in your jammies and sit in front of the television and eat dinner night – you are getting O L D!

But I LOVE IT!

And what is even better?

When the delivery boy tells you they are extremely embarrassed about the condition of your grilled chicken salad and a credit is going on your tab for next time.  SCORE!

And I thought the salad was just fine.

So anyway – since dinner is so much effort on Friday night, the least I can do is make a sweet treat for the Hubster.  (Is Marty lucky or what?!?)  🙂

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My guys love peaches, but not when they get very ripe.  I had a few “more ripe than they like” peaches that I thought I could do something with, and then I had this tube of refrigerator sugar cookie dough from who knows when in the fridge, so put that together…..

and I come up with Peach Cookie Cobbler!

peach cobbler cover

So, since this was just a wing it recipe (I should have measured thinking I would blog the recipe!) – we’ll give a shot at remembering the ingredients.

But I do want to tell you, friends – Don’t be afraid to wing it!  Just like cooking, baking does not have to be an exact science.  Experiment.  Improvise.  Use what you have and what tastes good or “right” to you!

So I gathered the peaches.

peachy

After peeling and slicing them (and munching on one!) – I squeezed some fresh lemon juice over them, added some sugar and cinnamon and a bit of flour to thicken.  (My guesstimate is about 1/2 cup sugar, 1 Tbsp cinnamon, and 1/4 cup flour to the 6 peaches)

peach cobbler 1

I put this mixture in an 8 inch round baking stone.

peach cobbler 2

Then I just pulled pieces of the cookie dough off and crumbled all over the top of the peaches.

peach cobbler 5

I sprinkled a little more cinnamon sugar on top and baked at 350 for 30 minutes.

peach cobbler 4

And Voila!  A quick and easy peach cookie cobbler.

This would work wonderfully with apples too!

Enjoy!

peach cobbler cover

Cheers & Hugs,

Jodi