Recipe Sunday - Nutella Pastry Puffs

So I'm thinking about being in the habit of posting a recipe every week or so. And with holidays coming up and the need to take desserts to different functions and events I figured I would start with one of my killer baked goods. Today we're going to make some Nutella Pastry Puffs. Extremely yummy. 

You will need only a few things:

• 1 box Puff Pastry sheets - 2 sheets thawed out
• 1 jar Nutella 
• 1 egg (for egg wash) - whisk egg white with 1 tablespoon of water

Optional things:

• 1 jar of Peanut Butter
• 1 bag mini marshmallows or marshmallow fluff
• Granulated sugar
• Powdered sugar

Now let's get this ball rolling. First off, you may want to go ahead and get your oven going. Preheat that beast to 350°F. 

You're going to need to get your pastry puff all spread out on your work surface. I sprinkled some flour lightly across my work area, this isn't necessary but does help once you start handling the pastry. Cut each square of your pastry into 4 equal size pieces. You may have to trim them a little to make them even, but then again they don't have to be perfect!

Grab your Nutella and smack it on there. Spread a couple of tablespoons into the centers of your little squares making sure to leave about a half inch to a quarter inch of pastry as a border around the edges. If you're putting in marshmallows or fluff or peanut butter go ahead and do that now. Keep in mind how you want your final product to come out. Want something reminiscent of s'mores? Then put approximately even amounts of Nutella to Marshmallow/Fluff. When it comes to the peanut butter, I don't want to tell you how to live your life but I would advise against using too much. Keep it at about 1 part PB to each 2 parts of Nutella. Remember that the PB is dryer and saltier than the more moist and sweet Nutella. 

Once you have all of your innards plastered into the center of your square, fold that thing up. You want to fold from one corner to the opposite corner making cute little triangles. Crimp the edges of the puff with the tines of a fork. Depending on the pastry that you're using and whether you used flour on your work surface or not you may need to use some water or a little egg wash to seal the edges of your puffs. Once all folded up, lightly brush the puffs with your egg wash (optional: sprinkle lightly with granulated sugar). 

Bake your little babies for 22-25 minutes or until the pastry is golden. Keep an eye on them and adjust accordingly. Remove from the oven and let them cool for about 5 minutes. Sprinkle with powdered sugar if you so please and nom down.

Makes: 8 puffs

Rating: 5/5 - Easy and quick to make. Very delicious. I give a higher rating to the plain Nutella puffs. I would only give the mixed PB/Nutella puffs a 3.5/5 just because I used a little too much PB. 

Hope everyone had a good weekend and has a great week!

PSA - Don't be a dick!

This is an open letter to the anyone who has ever yelled at/argued with/been ignorant to a person who is trying to provide a service to you.

I just want to state that you need to climb down off of your high horse and you need to get the hell over yourself. Everyday I face more abuse from customers that come into my workplace than I have ever endured outside of work. This brings me to my first point...

I don't care if you're coming in to buy a pack of cigarettes or a case of beer. If I ask for your ID, show me your damn ID. Don't say "I'm 28" or "My birthday is 7/26/87." I don't care. You want to know what I do care about? Seeing your ID. 

For example, this past week I was called a Bitch for telling a woman that looked no older than maybe 24 that I needed to see her ID for her to buy her beer. She said that I was being "F*cking ridiculous" for not selling the beer to her. Finally after yelling at me she pulled out her wallet and flipped it open showing that her ID was inside the entire time. I kindly asked her to take the ID out so that I could scan it (as per company policy), this is where it got fun. "It doesn't come out," attitude seething from every pore, "you can see my birthday." 

Side note: Don't argue with the person that you are trying to buy alcohol from. We're allowed to turn down the sale for damn near any reason. We don't very often turn people down except in situations having to do with age or IDs but start arguing with me about the fact that you don't want to pull your ID out of your wallet and I will NOT sell you your booze.

We all know where this story goes, the woman copped attitude with me, yelled at me, called me names and insulted me, then stated that she was "never coming back to this store again," but this is no surprise to me. I am not heartbroken by this revelation because I know you'll be back another day. This isn't the first time that I've dealt with you being an ass.

And here is where we come to the next stupid little thing that asshole customers berate us about...

I'm sorry, but sometimes we run out of things. I really can't help that. I have very little control over these things. Oh no! We're out of your snuff! I'm sorry Sir but we get our delivery truck approximately every other day and they only send us 1 or 2 rolls of the snuffs that we don't sell much of. I'm sorry that another man came in and bought all that we had yesterday. I can't turn down a sale because I need to save a few cans for you when I don't have any idea that you are going to buy it. Get over yourself. Stock fluctuates, people buy stuff, and there are shortages/strikes/disasters/local events that may effect our supply levels. How hard is this to understand?

I'm not saying that I don't care, because I do. I genuinely feel bad when I have to tell a customer that I am out of something, and have to ask them if they would like to have anything in its place or if they would like a refund (or to cancel their order). I feel bad and I try to fix the situation to the best of my ability as quickly as possible. What I'm saying is that I am absolutely enraged when I apologize and offer to you everything that I am able to offer to you and you still yell at me or get pissed off at me. Don't yell at me if I run out of tomatoes. I understand that you wanted them on your sandwich but I'm sorry, if we don't have any yelling at me won't change that situation. Please understand this and remember this!

I could go on and on about the way that I am treated by customers on a daily basis but I really don't want to be sitting here staring at my computer pissed off because I'm thinking about this crap. I also want to state that honestly the wonderfully nice customers, the regulars that come in, or even the random strangers that are awesome far outweigh the idiots and the drunks and the jerks. But as with everything the few bad apples can ruin the whole bunch (woah cliche). I love my job and I love my customers. I love talking to all of the different people that come through the doors everyday and the fun that I have makes it easier to deal with the ridiculousness that happens and because of that I can sit here and rant a bit, hoping that someone will read this and then not be a dick to someone else. I guess that would be the moral of the story - "Don't be a dick."

(I promise my next post will be less bitchy. =D)