The combination of a stat holiday and a nasty, blustery weather system made today a doubly great reason to stay in the house and stay warm. And the chance to warm up the oven? Ooh, can’t pass that up!
For Valentine’s Day, I got a new cookbook: Betty Goes Vegan by Annie and Dan Shannon. This might seem a tad unromantic, but a) I had been coveting this book since I first heard about it, and b) it was from my parents, so really, something a little more, um, personal would just have been inappropriate. And honestly, you can’t go wrong with a cookbook anyway. The first recipe I saw that really jumped off the page at me was Monte Cristo pockets. Why? Not sure. I was never a huge meat n’ cheese freak in my omnivorous days, but there was something about this recipe…
OMG…I’m so glad I tried this! I might cut back on either the time or temperature in the oven next time as my bottoms got a little overdone (on the bright side, I didn’t set off the smoke detector), but that’s such a minor little tweak. And for reasons unclear to me, I had a ton of filling left over – probably enough for another full batch – so I’ll likely get my chance to try that out sooner than I thought. Blackened bits aside, this pastry is, no joke, the flakiest, most amazing stuff ever! I’m glad I ate lunch before starting in on these, or I wouldn’t have had a picture to post.
And now, alas, I only have four…four Monte Cristo pockets left…
(Ah-ha-ha!)
The Witty Child 