new recipe!
I tried a new recipe today. I found it here. And now for a review!
First, I used canned chicken from Costco. One can did the trick. (So much easier than cooking chicken ahead of time and then shredding it.) Second, I didn't have 3 Tbs chicken stock, so I used 1 chicken bouillon cube and 3 Tbs water (approximately). Then since chicken bouillon is kinda salty, I added about 1/4 tsp garlic powder instead of 1/2 tsp garlic salt. I also figured they were referring to fresh onion, but I used about 1 Tbs dried instead. Aside from those changes, I followed the recipe pretty closely.
Filling was incredibly easy. I dumped everything in a pan, stirred it around for 2-3 min while it all heated up, made sure the cream cheese and butter was all mixed in, and it was good to go. (And that is why I used dried onion. SO much more convenient.)
Pastry part was... pretty much like making pie crust. It was a little less picky but the technique is the same. I have a decent hand at making pie crust, but it's not really my favorite thing ever because it's a little messy. So next time I might try *gasp* phylo dough or another type of pre-made dough, and add the paprika to the filling. I hear the recipe is pretty forgiving if you switch out the dough for premade stuff. I just have to weigh whether the cost of premade dough is worth the time it saves me; it probably depends on the day. If you've made pie crust, you can make this, but be warned the rolling out and cutting out does take some time.
Putting it all together was probably the most time consuming part. Maybe it was because I was super hungry by then. :) It's a good idea to have someone help you during this part if possible - it goes SO much faster. I suggest cutting out about half the pastry circles, then have a helper fill those while you finish cutting out the rest (or vice versa). That will cut down the prep time a fair amount. rhb did half and I did half and it was so much nicer than having to do them all myself!
As a side note, I do NOT recommend putting them together with the pan on top of an oven that is preheating - the residual heat is enough to start melting the butter in the pastry, and that makes it pretty tricky to handle. If you have an exceptionally warm kitchen you may want to cool the pans ahead of time, otherwise just keep them away from the oven and you'll be fine. (Logically that makes so much sense, and yet it took me half a pan to figure out why they were so slimy...)
Because the filling isn't too runny, I didn't have any issues with these leaking. They do drip butter from the crust as they cook though, so I lined my pans with aluminum foil for easy cleanup.
As far as yield goes, the recipe says it yields 2.5 dozen, but I easily got 4 dozen out of it. I also only put about half a teaspoon filling in each one since a whole teaspoon seemed like way too much for the size of my pastry circles. (I swear I used a 2.5 inch diameter circle to cut them out...) Not sure what accounts for the discrepancy there, but eating them the ratio seemed fine for pastry-to-filling. Of course, since they were so small I ended up eating about 10 of them... XD
Final verdict: although these were a little more work than originally anticipated, they were quite delicious. They work very well for appetizers but we had them for dinner and just ate more of them, so either one works. According to the original recipe, they freeze very well and heat up in 5-7 min in the oven or 1 min in the microwave... assuming you have enough left over to need to freeze them. (Between the two of us, rhb and I ate almost half of them just for dinner. Although I did share a few upstairs as payment for giving me the paprika. The rest are slated for lunch/dinner tomorrow.)
I was going to take a picture, but I put the leftovers away already... so too bad. :)
First, I used canned chicken from Costco. One can did the trick. (So much easier than cooking chicken ahead of time and then shredding it.) Second, I didn't have 3 Tbs chicken stock, so I used 1 chicken bouillon cube and 3 Tbs water (approximately). Then since chicken bouillon is kinda salty, I added about 1/4 tsp garlic powder instead of 1/2 tsp garlic salt. I also figured they were referring to fresh onion, but I used about 1 Tbs dried instead. Aside from those changes, I followed the recipe pretty closely.
Filling was incredibly easy. I dumped everything in a pan, stirred it around for 2-3 min while it all heated up, made sure the cream cheese and butter was all mixed in, and it was good to go. (And that is why I used dried onion. SO much more convenient.)
Pastry part was... pretty much like making pie crust. It was a little less picky but the technique is the same. I have a decent hand at making pie crust, but it's not really my favorite thing ever because it's a little messy. So next time I might try *gasp* phylo dough or another type of pre-made dough, and add the paprika to the filling. I hear the recipe is pretty forgiving if you switch out the dough for premade stuff. I just have to weigh whether the cost of premade dough is worth the time it saves me; it probably depends on the day. If you've made pie crust, you can make this, but be warned the rolling out and cutting out does take some time.
Putting it all together was probably the most time consuming part. Maybe it was because I was super hungry by then. :) It's a good idea to have someone help you during this part if possible - it goes SO much faster. I suggest cutting out about half the pastry circles, then have a helper fill those while you finish cutting out the rest (or vice versa). That will cut down the prep time a fair amount. rhb did half and I did half and it was so much nicer than having to do them all myself!
As a side note, I do NOT recommend putting them together with the pan on top of an oven that is preheating - the residual heat is enough to start melting the butter in the pastry, and that makes it pretty tricky to handle. If you have an exceptionally warm kitchen you may want to cool the pans ahead of time, otherwise just keep them away from the oven and you'll be fine. (Logically that makes so much sense, and yet it took me half a pan to figure out why they were so slimy...)
Because the filling isn't too runny, I didn't have any issues with these leaking. They do drip butter from the crust as they cook though, so I lined my pans with aluminum foil for easy cleanup.
As far as yield goes, the recipe says it yields 2.5 dozen, but I easily got 4 dozen out of it. I also only put about half a teaspoon filling in each one since a whole teaspoon seemed like way too much for the size of my pastry circles. (I swear I used a 2.5 inch diameter circle to cut them out...) Not sure what accounts for the discrepancy there, but eating them the ratio seemed fine for pastry-to-filling. Of course, since they were so small I ended up eating about 10 of them... XD
Final verdict: although these were a little more work than originally anticipated, they were quite delicious. They work very well for appetizers but we had them for dinner and just ate more of them, so either one works. According to the original recipe, they freeze very well and heat up in 5-7 min in the oven or 1 min in the microwave... assuming you have enough left over to need to freeze them. (Between the two of us, rhb and I ate almost half of them just for dinner. Although I did share a few upstairs as payment for giving me the paprika. The rest are slated for lunch/dinner tomorrow.)
I was going to take a picture, but I put the leftovers away already... so too bad. :)