What can Puff do for you?

Loving to cook and living alone can be a challenge. That is, unless you enjoy eating the same meal 5 times or watching your food go bad before you can finish it. As someone more like the fomer and not the later I'm always looking for ways to eat fresh, healthy, simple and here's the kicker - different meals. I'm learning that puff pastry can be a friend! You can freeze it so it's always on hand and it works for a variety of things. Have some veggies left over? Whip together a filling (just need other pantry staples like milk and corn starch) for a pot pie, cut out a square of puff pastry and you're all set, a pot pie for one. More veggies? Saute them and add them to a square of puff pastry you've partially cooked and put them back in the oven with some goat cheese - another tasty one person sized meal made possible thanks to puff pastry. Got to bring dessert to a dinner party? Roll out a puff pastry sheet, spread and press in a layer of sugar on each side, fold in towards the middle twice, slice in scant 1/2" sections, bake for just a bit and you've got palmiers (elephant ears), pick up a pint of ice cream on your way over and you'll be a hit!



Both the pot pie and vegetable tart I mentioned are recipes from the wonderful Heidi Swanson's cookbook, Cook 1.0. The elephant ears are from Ina Garten's cookbook, Barefoot in Paris .