The puff pastry braid is perfect as a starter or can be used as an appetizer for party. You can fill it with a variety of different ingredients, sweet or savoury, and it is a fantastic way to use the Christmas leftovers!
Ingredients:
Puff pastry 350 grams
Peppers 1 red and 1 yellow or orange
Ham, wafer thin slices 100 grams
Feta 80 grams
Eggs 1, slightly beaten
Sesame seeds 1 tbsp
Poppy seeds 1 tbsp
Method:
Cut the peppers into thin slices (about 3mm), stir fry them in a non stick skillet (I used my new ceramic skillet from Schmidt: it's amazing!) with a little bit of olive oil. Put few slices at a time in the pan to keep the peppers crunchy; don't cook them too much because they will go in the filling and be cooked again in the oven.
Season with salt and pepper just before taking the peppers out of the skillet, this will contribute to maintain them crisp. Let cool down.
Preheat the oven to 180°C.
In the meanwhile roll out the pastry to form a rectangle of 30x40 cm and 4 mm thick.
Put the cold peppers in the centre of the rectangle, crumble over the feta and lay on top the ham slices, roughly chopped.
Using a sharp knife create strips by making oblique cuts 3 cm apart on the long sides of the rectangle.
Fold on the filling the two short sides of the rectangle then brush the oblique strips with the beaten egg and fold 1 strip at a time over the filling alternating sides to create a braid-like shape.
Brush the top of the pastry with the remaining beaten egg, sprinkle with the seeds and cook in the preheated oven for about 20 minutes, until the surface will be slightly golden and puffed up.
Once cooled down cut into slices using a bread knife.
You don't like the peppers?
Try these alternative fillings: aubergines and canned tuna chunks or courgettes, brie and anchovies or why not try a sweet version using brown sugar, cinnamon and raisins?
If you liked this recipe and you'll decide to try it just send me some pictures: I will post them on my Facebook page!
