Brie, again.

I found these fantastic little dishes called “Brie Bakers” at a recent sale.  It’s basically a ceramic dish with a lid, that you bake brie in. I thought they were so brilliant that I scooped up a few of them to give as gifts.  Since that time, I’ve seen ads for them everywhere.

I love brie.  I rarely have it.  Having said that, I’ve served it twice in the past 3 weeks.  The first was the Brie with Caramelized Apples.  The second was a recipe that came with this handy little Brie Baker.  It called for slivered almonds, dried cranberries and a splash of maple syrup.  Pop it into the oven (the directions state “hot oven”; I set the temp for 275 F) and voila – 15 mins later you’ve got another delicious (artery-clogging, cholesterol-raising) appetizer.

If you’re interested in picking up one of these marvels, check out the following retail links:

Kitchen Stuff Plus
Cayne’s
Golda’s Kitchen
Amazon.com

Holiday entertaining idea: Brie with caramelized apples

With all of the holiday entertaining publications that have recently been distributed, I’ve received several ideas for serving brie.  Since I quite like brie, I’ve decided we should try a few out.  Tonight’s experiment: Brie with caramelized apples, brown sugar and pecans.  It was absolutely delicious!  Excuse the poor picture quality.

 

Bried with Caramlized Apples, Brown Sugar and Pecans

Okay, so what do you do to make this?

Freeze your brie for at least an hour.  We used a small round.  If you use a larger one, you may need to freeze it for longer.

While it’s in the freezer, peel and slice up an apple (small brie) or two (large brie).  Note: use apples that will stand up to cooking ie. Gala.  Don’t use an apple that turns to mush and is more suitable to making apple sauce.

Put apples into a frying pan with 1 tbspn butter (small brie) or two (large brie, 2 apples) and cook until apples turn brown.  I used medium to medium-low heat for this.

After the brie has been frozen, remove it from the freezer and cut the top off it.  I used a cheese slicer for this so that I wouldn’t remove too much of the cheese and could focus on removing the rind.  Arrange the apple slices on top of the brie.  Sprinkle with brown sugar.  The recipe that I based this off of called for 3 tablespoons of brown sugar.  I used just less than 1 tablespoon so adjust to your taste.  Sprinkle with nuts of your choice.  I crushed a few pecans.  Zap in the microwave anywhere from 1 to 3 minutes.  Watch your cheese.  Ours started to get gooey and melt at the 1:45 mark.

Remove from the microwave and serve with bread slices or crackers.  We used both and found both to be equally enjoyable.

The brie was initially nice and runny and easily scoopable with the crackers.  I would suggest having a spreader or two on hand though as those were also helpful.

Why do I run?  Because I like brie. 😉