One Thing Leads to Another
Jun 29th, 2008 by Marilyn
I started with a plan to demonstrate making white chocolate curls.
But Saturday afternoon, it was too hot outside and too cold inside. I attacked the half-frozen, half-melting stuff for a while and then, disgusted, shoved the chocolate aside and reached for some limeade. I opened the fridge and poked around the shelves, looking for…whatever you look for. When you’re mad.
The evening before, I’d mixed up some rugelach dough - cream cheese dough - planning to make a batch of pick-me-up cookies for a slightly depressed friend.
But I had a slab of incredible pepper bacon sitting around, and unable to resist its black-peppered, smoky goodness, I decided to use half the dough as a base for Tarte Flambee - sort of a bacon and onion pizza - for Friday night’s dinner.
Inspired by my head still in France and modernemama’s enthusiasm, it was bacony perfection, a license to eat four kinds of fat. Oh my.
Now it was Saturday and I was annoyed in the kitchen. I’d abandoned the white chocolate mess and was huffily munching cold bacon tart. Last I checked I’d come in here to do something, not just eat leftovers. I took another slurp of limeade, grabbed the remaining rugelach dough and looked in the fruit bowl.
Slim pickings. Josie eats drippy nectarines all summer like a fruit bat, and there was only one left.
But with a bit of cream cheese dough for crust, one nectarine turned into four little tarts.
There was still a little dough left. I could make a few rugelach for that sad friend of mine, or - nibbling the last chunk - I could finish it off myself.
Hmm. I had a rapidly decreasing ball of dough, and a few strawberries in the fridge. And a lone kiwi.
After a few minutes of rolling, pressing, more nibbling and baking, there were tart shells.
And the presence of tart shells called for the whipping of cream.
Now I had tart shells, honey whipped cream, strawberries, a peeled kiwi and one bowl of lonely, hardened white chocolate in the corner. I narrowed my eyes.
Please?
Oh, fine. Who wouldn’t forgive white chocolate? You can play too.
So the sad friend led to rugelach which didn’t get made, which led to a tart flambee, four nectarine tarts, some failed white chocolate curls, sliced strawberries, a kiwi and freshly whipped cream.
Finally, it led to a few pretty things at the end of the day. Just for fun, and just to show how when you least expect it, when you are hot and frustrated and sucking down limeade, everything has a way…
…of coming full circle.
Cream Cheese Dough
8 oz cream cheese, cold
8 oz unsalted butter, cold
2 cups all-purpose flour
pinch salt
Place flour and salt in food processor and process a few seconds, to blend. Chunk butter and cream cheese in pieces over flour, then process, using on-off motion, until dough just forms a ball. Turn out onto floured surface and knead lightly into a smooth mass.
Roll, shape and bake into tart crusts, sweet turnovers, rugelach, and other cookies.
Keeps several days wrapped in the refrigerator, and freezes well.
How yummy, creative, pretty, and fun!
Yeah… Um Marilyn… I’m uh feeling… kind of depressed myself…
I’m forlorn and sad and just really not happy.
uh…what to eat first…that’s the dilemma..everything sounds sooo good!
If you give a mouse a cookie…..
Love the strawberry-kiwi tarts. They look like something out of a magazine. Almost too pretty to eat. Almost.
I wish I had 1/10th of your creativity in the kitchen! Lovely photos as always.
This is the kind of cooking day I dream about — but have never actually had. Usually, when the first thing doesn’t go as planned, I call it a day.
I wish you had enough to share !
What you do with a few stray pieces of fruit and some dough is amazing. Spontaneous deliciousness is the best kind of surprise in the kitchen, don’t you think?
Wow. Just wow. I don’t even attempt half this stuff cause I fear the mess I’ll make.
Fruit bat!?!?! LMAO ROTF
Yum, Marilyn. That pizza looks so good and everything else too. I wish I had been there with you. Hee hee.
HPH - Thanks! Yummy always equals fun.
Rechelle & April - Fakers. Rugelach-scheming sister act!
T Does Wool - that’s how I feel looking at yarn on your site. I don’t know what I wish I could do first!
Jayne - Thank you. Remember, never too pretty to eat!
Joanne - Wish you were here to share the eating IN the kitchen!
Lydia - a mixed-up cooking day like this is fun, but a lot more fun without a job on the line!
Amy - Thanks! I am sending you virtual treats.
Wanderluster - spontaneous deliciousness does turn out tasty.
Jean - I make Josie clean everything up, didn’t you hear? Not.
Junebug - Thanks! Always room for one more in the kitchen.
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Those tiny tarts are so cute!