We had some leftover puff pastry from last Christmas in deep freeze, so we decided to thaw it and experiment with some turnovers. I guess I should have remembered the semi-disastrous jam in pan de sal experiments of only a few months ago, but I didn’t and thankfully, I didn’t have exploding turnovers… We still have several bottles of mangosteen jam that were slightly overcooked and therefore a little denser than the typical jam, but I thought they might make a nice filling for turnovers if thinned with some brandy and mixed in with freshly roasted cashew nuts.
To make the filling, I emptied an 8oz jar of mangosteen jam into a saucepan and added about a tablespoon of water and two tablespoons of brandy. Place this over low heat and watch in liquify and mix it with a spoon. Add about a cup or less of freshly roasted cashew nuts and take them off the flames. It will get rather sticky as it cools. If the jam looks too thick, add a little more water or brandy before you add the nuts.
Cut your puff pastry into roughly 4×4 inch squares (or whatever dimensions will make best use of your sheet of puff pastry. Fill the center with a tablespoon or so of the jam/nut mixture and brush some egg wash on the lip of the puff pastry to help it seal better. Fold over one corner of the puff pastry to create a nice triangular shape. Crimp the edges with your fingers or with a the tines of a fork. Brush tops with egg wash.
Place these on a baking sheet lined with a silpat mat or baking paper and place in a hot 375F oven until the pastries are golden brown.
Transfer to a cooling rack and serve warm or at room temperature. Some of the jam did manage to escape and make a bit of a mess on the silpat mat. But for the most part, the jam stayed inside the pastries and made for a rather appealing dessert. Just the right amount of sweetness in the flavorful mangosteen jam, and the substantial crunch of nuts. Flaky pastry made it all seem so luxurious. In our humid weather, this doesn’t last more than 6-10 hours before getting a bit limp… but they were good soon after coming out of the oven!
16 Responses
OMG. Two words for me: diet fail. :) The nuts are whole/halved, right?
Hi MM, one teeny suggestion (if at all possible). Can you show the timestamp to your blog uploads? Just curious (bordering on stalking, yes).
wow! delicious and i could even smell those pastries from my screen..
Beautiful pastry! Nakakagutom! :)
pastries! those look really yummy… btw, nice plates :)
Risa, sorry, that would mess with the design. But actually it’s irrelevant. I can write 4 posts in succession while in the garden sitting with the dog… then schedule them for four different days and time releases. In other words, the posts don’t necessarily reflect what I am actually doing at any one time. :) That is particularly relevant for trips, etc. where readers think they know where I am, but in fact I was there two weeks before… There are weeks where I may not write anything at all, but you still get a post a day. So the time stamp wouldn’t mean much. :) Comments, however, are done in real time, from wherever I may be at the time. :)
O man, I want one!
Looks yummy! You can never find one like that in the market…
MM, the bottom picture shows how flaky your turnover crust was. Yummy!
Hmm, you could offer this for sale along with Zubuchon…
Amazing color! Looks so delicious and if only I could reach for one!
Would they stop exploding if you pricked the pastries with a fork before baking?
so…. flaky! :)
sus, the pictures spell t-o-r-t-u-r-e!
Hi MM – your turnovers look delicious! Where do you buy your frozen puff pastry? I thought they have it in S&R, but when I looked for them in their Congressional branch, they do not have it.
Wow, those pictures of your freshly baked turnovers makes me droll. I want to try baking like that too. Yummy!