Enough Already!

Yet again we spent the evening saying ‘fare thee well’ to someone. It’s time to lock the city gates and staunch the exodus. I resorted to the usual behavior — tart, anyone?

The first is a blueberry-pineapple tart. I used my usual crust recipe. For the filling I whipped two packages of Neufchatel cheese with a small (6 oz?) can of crushed pineapple, drained. A couple of days ago I made a syrup from fresh pineapple puree, blueberries, and lime zest mixed with some sugar and finally a little corn starch/water mixture to thicken it. I spread that on top of the cream cheese/pineapple mixture and garnished with sweetened whipped cream. The syrup is also good on my yogurt.

For the second tart, I went the chocolate route. It’s really the best way to go.

It was the same crust and I liberally sprinkled pecan halves on top. Next, I made a caramel sauce from store-bought vanilla caramels that I melted with some whipping cream to yield a soft caramel sauce. I poured that on top of the pecans, reserving a little to use as garnish. The ganache is dark chocolate and whipping cream. The top is garnished with whipping cream, caramel sauce, and pecan halves.

It was much too dark for the kids, but I bought some Lofthouse sugar cookies for the kids anyway. Why waste good food on unappreciative tastebuds? 😉 I noticed they had several new (at least to us) flavors of sugar cookies (it’s really the frosting that is flavored, not the cookie itself) and we picked up orange and key lime and some plain with shocking pink frosting. The kids particularly liked the ‘key lime’ and the brilliant green color! Good, more tart for the grown ups! 😀