Pork Tenderloin with Pomegranate Braised Cabbage

I actually cooked this recipe up on Hallowe’en, but with my garnish it looked so darned festive I had to push back the publishing date to sometime when people start thinking of roasting chestnuts and Frosty the Snowman.  But for authenticity I am listening to Toccata and Fugue in D Minor while I type this up.  Spooky.  Yet festive.

Anyway, there are lots of things you can do with pork tenderloin, and they’re extra handy when you’re in a rush because they cook so quickly. In addition to roasting up nice and tender in the oven, you can also slice up raw tenderloin into medallions for a fast fry, which is what we do here.  This recipe, modified a bit, comes from a recent Every Day Food.

First you want to peel off all the silvery skin on your pork tenderloin, to make it extra tender.

Then you can slice it up into relatively thin medallions.  Mine are about 3/4″-1″ thick.

Then you will take a small cabbage (red one will be prettier, but I prefer the taste of green) like this one.

And chop it all up into shreds.

Now, heat some oil in your beautifully seasoned cast iron skillet and cook your pork medallions on medium-high until they are done all the way through and slightly brown on the outside.  Put them on a plate somewhere and cover them to keep them warm.

Then take your cabbage and plop it in your still hot skillet.  Cook that, tossing occasionally, until it’s all wilted.

Then pour in about 1 1/2 cups pomegranate juice.

Raise the heat a little bit and let that simmer down until it’s reduced to about half and starts to thicken.  I used unsweetened juice, so I suspect if mine had had more sugar in it it might have thickened a bit more (notice how there are two incidences of duplicated words in that sentence?).  At this point, add in about 3 tablespoons butter and a dash of red wine vinegar and you’re ready to serve.

I garnished my rather sadly coloured green cabbage with some steamed frozen peas and some fresh pomegranate seeds for festivity’s sake, and we had roasted potatoes on the side.  It was highly tasty.

VERSUS: Two Ways to Bust Open a Pomegranate

Somewhere in the world it is pomegranate season.  I know this because for once, the shiny red fruit arriving in our St. John’s stores is lustrous and blemish-free.  So they’re raring to go.  Plus, instead of spending $6-$7 per fruit, I’m only spending $3.  That’s still a lot, but you know, it’s Newfoundland.  I’ve long since stopped being concerned about saving money on produce.  Just ain’t gonna happen.

Especially when you consider how awesomely good a pomegranate is.  I used to love picking them apart as a kid.  I appreciate food you have to work for, like artichokes.  I think my mother loved them too because it kept me quiet and occupied for long periods of time, though it was quite messy.  Small price to pay I suppose.

As far as I know, there are two decent ways to get all those juicy seeds out of a pomegranate.  There is the official, POM-certified method (which has its own brochure, situated neatly above the pomegranate bins at the grocery store), and then there’s the way that we all learned recently from the internet, which I call the SMASHY method.  I bought two pomegranates the other day so I thought I would test both methods at the same time and tell you which one I liked the best.  It’s a battle!

The Smashy Method:

This is the most fun I think of the two methods.  First, you pare off the top and bottom of the pomegranate.

Then you score the skin around in a circle.

And carefully pry it apart into two pieces.

Set the fruit cut side down on your palm over a bowl, and make a little loose cup out of your fingers so the fruit can fall through.  Then you take a giant spoon, and you start smacking the skin of that pomegranate half.  I mean you can really go to town, smacking it all over.

And the fruit will start to fall between your fingers into the bowl.

And the skin will start to crack.  Keep going.  Beat the crap out of that thing.

Of course there will be casualties.  Some seeds may fly elsewhere. Fortunately our canine vacuum is a fan of any form of fruit that may fall on his floor.

But it’s quite effective in getting most of the stuff out.

It does tend to leave some large chunks of pith in your bowl.

Not to mention splatters of pomegranate juice in places  you’d rather it wasn’t.

The Official Method:

Chop off the top and bottom and score and pry apart, just like last time.

Submerge your fruit in a bowl of water and gently pull off the seeds.

This may take a while.

But note how the pith just floats to the top.  You can scoop it out with a slotted spoon or your fingers.  I ended up dumping the fruits of my labour (hahaha) with the other method into the water bowl as well, to get rid of the extra pith.

Then you just pour it all into a strainer to drain and you’re good to go.

VERDICT: While the “official” method was tidier, it took a lot longer (and didn’t involve hitting things with a spoon).  If there were ways to combine the two methods (smacking it with a spoon while under water) then I’d be completely sold.  Until someone comes up with a method like that, I’m just going to sit here and eat these.

Pumpkin Creme Brulee

Because we didn’t get any trick-or-treaters this year (or any year), I was able to take the pumpkins from our pumpkin-off and cut them up shortly after we carved them in order to make use of all that lovely pumpkin flesh.  And I ended up, after hacking and cutting and boiling and puréeing, with 14 cups of usable pumpkin goo.  So you’re going to get a lot of pumpkin recipes.  I hope you like pumpkin.

I have never made crème brulée before.  But for many years, the Pie and I were in possession of a tiny butane brulée torch.  Then about two years ago I decided we were never going to make crème brulée and I got rid of it.  And THEN, after doing that, I discovered how freaking easy they were to make.  Yes, I did kick myself a little.  Not to fret, though: you can do the bruléeing with the help of your broiler.  It doesn’t do as even a job as a torch, so you have to rotate your ramekins while you’re doing it, but it does work.  And this pumpkin crème brûlée from The Foodess looks too easy and too lovely to resist.  In fact, way easier than regular crème brûlée.  So we’re doing it.

Preheat your oven to 325°F and set a kettle of water on the boil.  Find a large baking dish and eight 3/4 cup ramekins.  You’ll note here I used four ~1 1/3 cup ramekins.  You may need two baking dishes.

In a small saucepan, bring 2 cups whipping cream to a simmer.

In a large bowl, whisk together 2 cups pumpkin purée (the plain stuff, not the pie filling), 1/2 cup granulated sugar, 1/3 cup brown sugar, 5 egg yolks (save the whites for something awesome), 1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract, a sprinkle of salt, and 2 teaspoons pumpkin pie spice.

Ever so slowly, dribble the hot cream into the pumpkin mixture and whisk it up.

Divide the mixture among your ramekins and place them in the baking dishes.  Pour boiling water into the dishes until it comes about halfway up the sides of the ramekins.

Then pop that in the oven, middle rack, and bake for about 35 minutes (with my larger ramekins I baked mine for 55 minutes), until the centres of the puddings are just set.

Transfer the puddings to a wire rack to cool for 15 minutes, then chuck them in the fridge for at least two hours.  You can make these the day ahead, and you can even freeze the chilled ramekins to eat later.  Just wrap them up carefully before freezing.

Just before serving, you can take the puddings out of the fridge (or freezer) and sprinkle the tops of each with about 1 teaspoon granulated sugar (the plain white stuff works best for caramelizing).  If you’ve got one, use a brûlée torch to quickly and evenly caramelize the sugar and then serve immediately.

I didn’t have a brûlée torch (see above(, so I used my broiler.  Thing is, even if you move the puddings around under the broiler (easier said than done), they still don’t caramelize evenly.  So I had some charred spots and some spots that were hard and crackly, but not brown.  Not to mention that all that time under the broiler heated up the pudding itself, which is supposed to be served cold.  Alas.  But they were still super tasty, with a nice crackly top, despite what this picture may be telling you.

Rum-Raspberry Meringues

I had to fill in (on rather short notice) for one of the members of my Sweet Treats group at work, and so this is what I came up with.  I LOVE (love, love, love) meringues.  Always have.  In fact I think they’re the first thing I ever baked.  And so every time I make something with egg yolks I take advantage of the extra whites and whip up a batch.  The Pie isn’t a huge fan of the crispy, chewy, sugary goodness, but that hasn’t stopped me yet.  I’ve even branched out and made different varieties of chocolate meringue, one of which I posted about here.  But I keep seeing fruity versions, so I thought I’d give that a go.  Most of the recipes call for food colouring and raspberry or strawberry extract, neither of which are particularly yummy to me.  I mean, I understand why you would use them in this case — the fluffy egg whites are pretty delicate and would collapse if you put too much heavy stuff into the mix.

But I think we can give this a bit of a go, with some real fruit.  We just have to be very careful.

What you need is some egg whites, at room temperature.  I have some pasteurized egg whites that came in a carton which has been sitting in my freezer since Cait and Jul were here, so I might as well use that. Then you need some cream of tartar, which is your stiffening agent. And some sugar.  For sweetness.  Obviously.  You can use any sweetener you like, but I prefer the ease of good old regular sugar.

And you need some fruit.  I’m going to use about a cup and a half of frozen raspberries here, which I thawed, and I’m going to gently stew them for a little bit with 1 teaspoon corn starch.  To prevent lumps of corn starch forming, mix the spoonful of starch with a small amount of the raspberry juice first, to form a slurry (this technique works really well when adding thickener to gravies, too).  I added in a tablespoon or so of sugar, just to get rid of the bite of the raspberry acid.

Then I’m going to strain them (and by that I mean shove the mess through a sieve with a spoon), and come out with a nice little coulis.  Let that cool for a bit.

Now you can start your meringues.  Preheat your oven to 250°F and line some baking sheets with parchment paper.

The regular proportions I use come from The Joy of Cooking, and involve 4 egg whites, 1/2 teaspoon cream of tartar, 1 teaspoon vanilla (which I made from rum!) and 1 cup sugar.  You can multiply or divide this recipe however you wish.  In my carton o’ egg whites the label says there is the equivalent of 8 egg whites, so I’m going with that proportion, which is a double batch.

Of course, I didn’t learn until after I’d put it all together that pasteurized egg whites (such as those that come in a carton) do not lend themselves well to making meringue.  So I had to start all over again.

SO very much not what I was aiming for.

So you have your room temperature egg whites, and you chuck them in the bowl of a mixer with your cream of tartar and your rum/vanilla, and you beat the crap out of it with your whisk-y thing.  When you’ve got nice foamy peaks, you can start adding your sugar in, a little bit at a time.  Keep beating until you have nice firm peaks.

That’s more like it!

These peaks not only hold their own weight, but they can support the weight of the heavy metal whisk as well!

Once the egg whites form stiff peaks, you can gently fold in your coulis.

I spooned the meringue stuff onto the baking sheets in decent cookie-sized heaps, and ended up with 42 of them.  Bake them for 1 1/2 to 2 hours (maybe a bit longer if they’re still squishy on the bottom, and make sure to rotate your sheets if you’ve got them on two levels), and let them cool inside the oven after you’ve turned it off.  If you cool them too quickly they’ll collapse.  Store them in an airtight container and make sure to eat them all within a few days of baking.

Greetings from inside the oven …

These are strongly reminiscent of those fruit-flavoured hard candies that they hand out in restaurants, that you suck on for a while and then you chew and the inside is all squishy and sticks together.  That’s what biting on these is like.  Taste is very similar, too.

Driving “Up Island” in a Smart Car

This is my last post about our west coast trip, I promise.

While we were staying in Victoria, the Pie and I took two days out and drove up to Courtenay to visit Tim, one of the Pie’s childhood friends from Ottawa who had made the move west.  Tim was best man at our wedding.  There’s pretty much only one highway that goes the length of Vancouver Island, and if you go anywhere north of Victoria you are going “up island”.  Courtenay-Comox, while situated pretty much in the middle of the length of the island, is considered to be the farthest you want to go up island.  When I was a child, I actually thought it WAS at the northern tip of the island.  It turns out instead that nobody really wants to go that much farther than Courtenay-Comox, and the best way to go further is to take a boat.

So we rented a car.  My firm gets me a corporate discount at Enterprise rentals, and they’ve always treated me well.  Since it was just the two of us and we were only traveling for two days we rented an economy-sized car.  I joked as we were waiting in line that I’d love to take the little Smart Car in the parking lot on our trip, and the Pie rolled his eyes.  Little did we know that it was the only “economy” sized car left in the lot!  Have I mentioned that the Pie is 6’4″?  This was going to be interesting.

Neither of us had ever driven a Smart Car before so we took it on as a challenge. Here is the super-awesomely small rear view mirror. There are no blind spots in this car, so it’s not a huge deal.

And the nonexistent leg room.  And the lack of gadgets. And our pasty, pasty legs.

But the whole roof was glass, which was neat when you are driving through the mountains.

Though because the car is energy-efficient, it seemed to always want to be in the highest gear possible, which meant it rumbled along like it had a diesel engine.  An engine that never wanted to accelerate, and that shifted violently, like a newbie on a standard transmission.  And it was an automatic!

We booked it up to Courtenay, sliding through Chemainus and its famous murals and Nanaimo, where we got a coffee.

We hit Tim’s place in the mid-afternoon, and he took us out to Stotan Falls to cool off, as it was about 33°C and sunny.

This series of short falls is a very popular place to come and sit in the sun and the water.  While much of it is very shallow, the limestone has worn away in spots to form these potholes, which can catch you unawares.

Some of them are large enough to tuck yourself into, as Tim demonstrates here.

And you can swim in the deeper, cool water just after the falls.  Floater that I am, I nearly got swept away because I couldn’t get my feet under me, but Tim hauled me out safe.

In trekking around, we also got to see some neat fossils. That’s my foot, for scale.

As well as the sheer neatness of the geology of this area.

That night we drove to Comox and had dinner on the sandy beach near CFB Comox.  While planes took off behind us, the sun set to our left.

The water was so warm that even the Pie went into the ocean and swam.  This is a history-making moment, people.

This dog never left the water!

On the way home we got a brief tour of the organic spa that Tim owns with his partner Lisa.  If you’re ever in Courtenay and you need a massage, Ziva is the place to visit.  After my ordeal in the rapids I could have used a massage myself, but it was late.

The next morning, after saying our goodbyes, the Pie and I began our trek south, though in a more leisurely manner.  We stopped at a farmer’s market in Qualicum Beach, which happens every Saturday.

Our breakfast consisted of some locally roasted organic coffee, local tay berries, and home-made cinnamon sticky buns.

The tay berries taste like a combination between raspberries and blackberries, and look like logan berries (what’s the difference, anyway?).

The cinnamon buns were so sticky and delicious we may have died a little.

These were my sticky and stained hands at the beginning of breakfast.  By the end I was a total mess. The camera was going to get sticky if we took a picture of that so we refrained.

Then back to our Smart Car, which we had dubbed Blinky.

To give you a sense of scale …

We paused at the Little Qualicum River Falls, which were stunning.  I took way too many pictures, but you can see some below.

And had a brief stop in Cathedral Grove, home to some of the oldest and tallest trees on the island. We didn’t stick around too long, because the Falls hike and the Falls themselves had made us very thirsty.

Then we had lunch in Coombs, which has to be one of the weirdest towns I have ever seen.  This exporter seemed to own the whole place, and had these strange (and not for sale) sculptures all over the open space.  The wooden and marble sculptures inside were even more fantastical, and many of them were pornographic.  We weren’t allowed to photograph any of them, though, and I’m not even going to get started on some of the strange chairs they had there.

In the same place was Goats on Roof, a market place specializing in imported foods.  And all sorts of kitschy Asian paraphernalia, like these lanterns, which hung everywhere in the store.

Let’s not forget that there were actual goats on the roof.

It was a long drive both ways, but in the Smart Car we only went through one tank of gas, even with all our perambulations.  It was a nice change of pace to be on our own schedule and under our own steam, and we quite enjoyed the trip.  I was very sad when we had to return Blinky.  Not a good car for highway driving, but a fun challenge nonetheless.  And backing up was AWESOME. What a fun trip!

Fluffy Gluten-Free Waffles

This recipe is a modified version of the one that Iris over at the Daily Dietribe came up with.  I am indebted to her extensive experimentation.  Jul, who eats only gluten-free foods, is also indebted.  And the Pie and Cait are just full.

Iris has experimented enough that she knows which flours will do what, so I followed her advice and used a combination of almond flour and brown rice flour.

Take 1 1/4 cups of the flour and whisk it together with 1/2 cup starch (potato works best but I used corn starch because I can’t find it here), 2 teaspoons baking powder, and 2 tablespoons granulated sugar.

In another, larger bowl, whisk together 1/4 cup unsweetened applesauce, 2 tablespoons melted butter, and between 1/2 and 1 3/4 cups buttermilk (the amount will depend on what kind of flour you are using.  Here I used about 3/4 cup).

For a dairy-free version (and this is already egg-free), you can use 2 tablespoons vegetable oil instead of butter, and instead of the buttermilk you could go for coconut milk.

Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients and stir until combined.  Add more liquid, if necessary, a little bit at a time.  If you are making waffles, you’ll want your batter to be a little thicker, while with pancakes you’ll want it a bit runnier.

Then you just pour the batter into a pan or smooth it into a waffle iron and you’re all set. I loved how this was just as simple as making regular buttermilk waffles and took no time at all.

These came out a little darker than I was expecting but they were lovely and crisp, even after I left them to warm in the oven.   Just make sure to spray your waffle iron or your pan frequently or they will stick.

Rhubarb Crumble

I feel like this would have turned out better if I hadn’t followed the instructions, but it was pretty good as it was.

Preheat your oven to 350°F and chop up 3 cups young rhubarb.  I like to make it into cubes.

Toss the rhubarb with 1 tablespoon flour, 1/2 cup granulated sugar, and 1 teaspoon cinnamon.

I also added in some frozen strawberries, chopped, so I didn’t add in the 1 tablespoon water the recipe called for.  I figured the ice from the strawberries was enough.

Chuck those in the bottom of a baking dish.

In a small bowl, cream together 6 tablespoons butter, 6 tablespoons flour, and 1/2 cup packed brown sugar.  Now, if I’d had my druthers, there would have been no creaming.  I would have simply cut them all together until crumbly, like I do with the apple crumble.  You know, so it’s crumbly.  But whatevs.

Then stir in 1/2 cup oats.  So now you have this nice buttery dough.  If you’d just cut it in you’d be able to sprinkle it over the whole thing.  But what’s done is done.

Smooth that dough over the top of the rhubarb.

Chuck the whole thing in the oven for 40 minutes, until the fruit is bubbling and the top is crispy.

Bubbling fruit …

… crispy top.

Allow to cool slightly before serving with ice cream.  SOOOOO GOOD.

Pop Goes the Rhubarb

Welcome Freshly Pressed visitors!

We’re rather lucky here in Newfoundland.  We don’t get all of the same holidays as some of the other provinces, but in the summer, we get extra — especially if you live in St. John’s, where the first Wednesday in August is a municipal holiday.  Anyway, this year in particular we have lucked in.  Last Monday was our Discovery Day holiday, celebrating the arrival of Europeans on our rocky coast.  Today is the bank holiday for Canada Day, which was yesterday (or Memorial Day, as it is also known here).  And then next Monday is Orangemen’s Day.  So we get three long weekends and three four-day weeks in a row.  You really can’t beat that.

So why not celebrate this summer bounty with a refreshing beverage?

When my mother was here (and we were in Portland) she bought me some fresh rhubarb and was going to process it and make something out of it but she ran out of time.  It was starting to look a little woebegone after she left so I figured I should bite the bullet and git ‘er done. And yes, rhubarb can be woebegone. I swear.

This is a simple syrup made from rhubarb that you can add to any fizzy drink for a sweet and tart kick.  And by simple I mean it’s really freaking easy.

Start with some fresh rhubarb.  Wash it and dice it up.  You’ll need about 1 1/2 cups diced rhubarb for this one.

Grab a small saucepan and toss in 1/2 cup granulated sugar and 1/2 cup water.  I added in a teaspoon of vanilla as well.

Bring that to a boil, stirring constantly.

Chuck in the rhubarb and stir to coat before removing from the heat.

Cover the rhubarb and leave it to steep (like a tea!) for an hour.

Strain the steeped rhubarb over a cup or bowl.

I kept the steamed rhubarb for snacking.  Neither the Pie nor Gren were impressed with it, but that just means more for me.

Add 2 teaspoons lemon juice to the syrup and stir.

You can keep the syrup in the fridge for about a week, if you cover it.

Use about an ounce of the syrup in a small glass with ice, and add soda water or gingerale for a fruity fizz.  This makes about six drinks if you use small glasses, about three if you use big ones.

Candy Bar Pancakes

Gren: “Are you guys making pancakes?”

Me: “No.”

Gren: “Really?  I don’t believe you. I’m pretty sure you’re making pancakes …”

The Pie and I rarely use our dining room (for eating at least) when it’s just the two of us.  But pretty much every Saturday morning since we moved into Elizabeth has been spent making “special breakfast”, where we do something a little more elaborate than the regular cereal or toast, and we eat it together in our dining room, which offers a charming view of our next-door neighbour’s shed.

In addition, we like to try to recreate things that we’ve eaten in restaurants, just to see if we can’t make them a little better.  Monday’s green curry was one example of that.  This is another, and it comes from one of our favourite restaurants.  They call them “candy bar” pancakes, which is a little odd, because most Canadians call things like Mars Bars and Snickers “chocolate bars” (because they’re made from chocolate, not candy).  Maybe the creators just thought “candy bar pancakes” sounded better than “chocolate bar pancakes”, or maybe it’s because the high number of American soldiers stationed in Newfoundland at various points in history have left a lasting remnant of their dialect.  Who knows …

You can use any pancake recipe you’d like for this, though I would recommend a fluffy pancake rather than a flat one.  If you don’t have a favourite recipe, I’ll give you mine, which comes from the Joy of Cooking, and we usually cut it in half because it’s just the two of us.

Take a chocolate bar or two.  The “dry” kind work best, like Kit Kat or Coffee Crisp — anything without caramel or gooey things inside. We prefer the Coffee Crisp because of the different flavours inside. If you live in the US, see if you can get someone to bring one across the border for you — they are excellent.

Break it up into pieces and put it in the food processor.

Pulse until you have small crumbs.  Set that aside.

In one medium-sized bowl, whisk together 1 1/2 cups all purpose flour, 3 tablespoons granulated sugar, 1 3/4 tablespoons baking powder, and 1/2 teaspoon baking soda. If you are making this recipe with milk instead of buttermilk, then leave out the baking soda.

In another bowl, whisk together 1 1/2 cups buttermilk, 3 tablespoons melted butter, and 1/2 teaspoon vanilla.

Whisk the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and you’re ready to go.

Use a cast iron skillet to get the best crust on your pancakes.  Preheat the skillet at medium for a few minutes while you’re mixing up your ingredients.  And before you pour in the batter, melt a bit of butter in the pan first.  Then scoop in some batter and let it sit for a while.

Don’t touch it.  Wait until it starts to bubble and get pitted.  The trick with these pancakes is  in cooking them for as long as possible on the first side, so that when you add the chocolate bar pieces to the other side you don’t have to cook it as long and they won’t burn.

While you wait for it to get pitted, you can play fetch with your dog.

This squeaky carrot is from IKEA.  I’m never sure if their stuffed toys are for dogs or for children, but they work great either way.

Take a spoon and sprinkle some of your chocolate crumbs onto the pitted top of the pancake.  Let them sink into the batter a little bit.

THEN you can flip it, quickly.  Don’t cook it too long on the second side or the chocolate will burn.

Serve hot with butter and maple syrup.

Or blueberry syrup.  Or whatever floats your boat on a Saturday morning.

Cheesecake Rolls, or something like that.

The Pie wanted to call these things “fruit puffs” but that didn’t seem right to me.  I’m still trying to come up with something catchy, as these things happened almost by accident.

While I was away in Ottawa with Gren, the Pie had purchased some strawberries on sale and they needed to be eaten.  As well, in retrieving something from the freezer, he’d pulled out some cream cheese and forgotten to put it back until it was already thawed, so we needed to eat that as well.  Cheesecake comes to mind, doesn’t it?  Or a strawberry cream cheese pie?  That is what the internet told me to do.  But I didn’t have anything on hand with which to make a crust.  I DID, however, have some puff pastry that was nearing its expiration date (you see how I don’t like to let things go to waste?)

So I made up this bad boy of a recipe, which has a strawberry and a banana variation.

Make sure your package of puff pastry has fully thawed and your cream cheese is room temperature.

Chop up about 1 cup to 1 1/2 cups fresh strawberries.  Sprinkle them with 2 tablespoons granulated sugar and add a dash of vodka, to bring the juices out.  Leave that to sit for a spell.

Slice up about 2 bananas.  Sprinkle those suckers with 2 tablespoons brown sugar, add a few pinches cinnamon, and a dash of dark rum, and leave it to marinate a bit.

In a smallish bowl, use a hand mixer to beat together 1 250g package plain cream cheese, 1 large egg, 2 teaspoons vanilla extract, and 1/3 cup granulated sugar.  Then repeat that whole process in another bowl.

Preheat your oven to 350°F and haul out a non-stick baking sheet.

On a floured surface, roll out both halves of 1 package puff pastry until they are the approximate diameter of a dinner plate.

Place one piece of pastry on one side of your baking sheet.  Take one of the bowls of cream cheese mixture and pour it carefully into the centre of the pastry.  You may need to hold up some of the sides if it’s runny.  Also, don’t feel pressured to use all the cream cheese or even all the fruit, if it doesn’t look like it’s going to fit.

Now plop your fruit on top of that.

Then exercise all sorts of magic physics and wrap that sucker up like a burrito.  Or something close to a burrito.  Or whatever sticks together.  I found that if you had one end that was longer than all the others if you folded it over the top everything kind of stayed in place.

For the most part.

Bake your cheesecake burritos for 35-45 minutes, until the pastry is puffy and golden and the filling has set.

Allow them to cool most of the way before cutting and eating them.

Store the leftovers wrapped in the fridge for a few days.  If there are any left!