#4. Puff Pastry Cinnamon Twists

After making Onion, Thyme, and Goat Cheese Tarts, I had a second sheet of frozen puff pastry left over. I wanted to do something very simple with it, so in the "Puff Pastry" section of my 75th Anniversary edition of Joy of Cooking, I found a recipe for cinnamon twists. Actually, it was just a heading with instructions to follow the recipe for Cheese Straws (in the "Appetizers" section), substituting cinnamon and sugar for the cheese and salt and pepper. (Also, it said you shouldn't cook them as long, though I don't think it said how long to cook them.)

The cheese straws recipe was annoyingly long. Just thaw the puff pastry dough (I put it on a plate on the counter for and hour and a half), then roll it out on a floured surface to a size just larger than a legal pad. (The recipe called for two sheets stacked on top of each other, to be rolled out to 16"X 10".) Mix about 4 tbsp of sugar and 2 tsp of cinnamon in a little bowl (I spilled the cinnamon and accidentally used a lot more as a result, but that was okay). Brush 2/3 of the dough with water (measuring lengthwise--you should basically be making a large, wet square at one end), and onto the wet part, sprinkle 1/3 of the cinnamon and sugar. Fold the non-sugary third over the middle, and then fold the final third on top of that. Roll the dough out again. Repeat the wetting/sugaring/folding process. Wrap the dough in plastic and refrigerate 1 hr.

Preheat the oven to 375. Roll the dough out again. (For the final rolling, I rolled the dough out directly on baking parchment on top of a cookie sheet and just placed the finished twists in any free place on the parchment as I cut the pastry.) Trim the edges of the pastry dough so that you have a straight rectangle and so that all the edges are cut (you must only press (a butter knife will do) and pull the pastry to cut it--do not drag the knife along or the pastry will not rise properly). You can cook the edge trimmings along with the twists... they are funny-looking, but taste just as good.

Cut the rectangle in half lengthwise, and cut each strip into crosswise strips just over 1/4" wide (I thought I would make fatter ones at first, but they do not twist as easily). Twist each strip three times and place it on the baking sheet. When you are done twisting all the pastry, sprinkle the twists with the last 1/3 of the cinnamon-sugar. Cook for 8 minutes or so on one oven rack, then turn the tray 180 degrees and cook another 8 minutes on the other rack. (If you have made two sheets of pastry, you will have two trays of twists that you must switch, but this sounds dangerous. I tried this with pies once and got two big burns on my arms.)

I tried a bunch of different ways of presenting these on a plate. (I hadn't tasted them yet, otherwise I would not have dallied so long.)

I tried photographing just a single pastry:

Then I turned it to a diagonal:

Then I stacked three like a hayrick and came at 'em from the side:

Then I lay them all down in a row:

And again, turned the plate diagonally:

But all the photos came out dark and blurry, so it really didn't matter. Oops.

I cooked the pastries 10 minutes on each rack, and they came out a bit overdone. Still, my roommate and I got into them immediately. I cooked them in the evening (concurrent with my dinner) so that they were done at dessert time, and by the next day, there were only two left in a little bowl. I don't remember how many there were to start... maybe two dozen? In the morning, I folded the parchment I had cooked them on and spilled all the fallen cinnamon sugar into my coffee and dunked the last two twists. This was VERY, VERY GOOD. But then, alas, they were all gone.