Baking with Carla: Ecclés, aka puff pastry pockets

Despite the fancy name, these are nothing else but puff pastry pockets! Ahhh, the French! They can make anything sound better and fancier simply with their chic names.

Lately Carla and I have neglected reading. We usually read a short story or part of a book (in Italian) while our goodies are in the oven. But lately we got a lot into baking things that take most of the hour we have available to be prepared and so we haven’t been reading much.

Last week we realized how much we missed reading so I decided to make this recipe because it’s super quick to prepare and it would have saved us time to read a good story. Well, I read the story J

Going through an old little French book I have (French because it’s in French!), looking for new recipes I found these ecclés, which, as I said, are nothing else but puff pastry pockets filled with raisins. You really don’t need a recipe to make these pockets. Just thaw the puff pastry, cut it in squares or rounds, filled them with whatever yummy things you have available and seal the pockets. 

Perfect for a last minut afternoon snack.

Ecclés

Ingredients

Yields 9-10 pockets

250-300 gr (1 sheet) puff pastry, thawed

30 gr (2 tbsp) unsalted butter, at room temperature

30 gr (2 tbsp) light brown sugar

100 gr rasisin

50 gr chocolate chips

10 gr (2 tsp) of your favorite spices*

(2 tsp) orange zest (optional)

egg for egg wash or milk

*nutmeg, ginger, or cinnamon will do, depending on the filling you chose

Method

Preheat the oven to 425F degrees and prepare a baking sheet with parchment paper.

In a bowl, mix the butter and the sugar together until you obtain a cream. Toss in your chose filling (raisin, chocolate chips, nuts, etc) and the orange zest, if you decide to use it.

Put the thawed puff pastry on a flat surface sprinkled with some flour and cut out about 9-10 little rounds or squares.

Spoon the filling in the center of the little puff pastry cut outs (don’t put too much filling, one tablespoon will do).

Close the rounds/squares of puff pastries into little pockets. Wet the tips of your fingers to seal the pockets.

With a rolling pin, gently flatten out the pockets and brush them with a little milk (as you know sometimes I really don’t like doing the egg wash. I adds unnecessary calories/heaviness to a simple recipe and you waste an egg! When possible I just brush some milk).

Place the pockets on the prepared baking sheet and apply two or three small cuts on top of each.

Bake for about 15 minutes. When ready, let them cool out on a cooling rack before serving them.

Have a sweet day!