Tomato and Baby Bell Pepper Tartlets

First of all thank you all SO much for your prayers and well-wishes yesterday for Chris!  They were so appreciated and meant a lot.  His appointment went really well and the doctor said he was completely fine.  The abnormality they found was something he was born with and shouldn’t affect him at all.

Whew!

Of course he was then cleared for hockey and will be playing again next week despite pathetically begging and pleading with him...sigh, oh stubborn men.  Anyway, I'm SO glad all that stress is finally over so now lemme show you what I made this past weekend!

I found these Tomato and Baby Bell Pepper Tartelets in my December issue of Cooking Light and I have officially found a new favorite for Chris and myself.  Success!  These were seriously SOOOO good!  I had lots of grape tomatoes leftover from my candied balsamic tomato and mozzarella salad so I was excited to try these.

These are fabulous little appetizers for any party, or in our case, they made perfect finger foods for our football Sunday!  Yes, I am fully aware that the Skins are no longer playing {le sigh} but uh did you see Mr. Tebow?!  He killed it!  Anyway, back to food...I had never used puff pastry before, but it was really fun to work with and now I've officially decided I'm making skinny cinnamon rolls with it in the near future.

Stay tuned. 

Since Chris devoured these in about 3 seconds flat (no exaggeration here whatsoever), I decided to ask for HIS educated opinion on these bite-sized treats.  And I quote:

"I liked how fluffy and flaky these were and the peppers had the perfect amount of sweetness with still a little spice and they reminded me of little pizzas, you know, minus the sauce.  Can you go ahead and make another batch please?  Um, now?"

So there ya go, and that's coming from the pickiest eater alive.  You should probably go ahead and take my word on it.

(Excuse my pasty white hands, the sun misses me)

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Servings: 10

Serving Size: 2 tartlets 

Calories: 153

Fat: 5.1 g

Carbs: 12.4 g

Fiber: 0.7 g

Protein: 3.1 g

Old Points: 3 pts

Points+: 3.3 pts

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Here are your ingredients:

Recipe adapted from Cooking Light 

1 sheet frozen puff pastry dough, thawed

1/4 cup (1 oz) grated Parmesan cheese

2 Tbsp light mayonnaise

1 small garlic clove, minced

8 grape tomatoes, cut into 1/8-inch thick slices

3 baby bell peppers, cut into 1/8-inch thick rings

2 Tbsp fresh thyme leaves

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F.  Unfold dough and place on a work surface lightly dusted with flour.  Roll gently into a 10 x 9-inch rectangle.  Cut dough into 20 rectangles and prick each dough piece liberally with a fork.  Arrange dough pieces on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper.  Chill about 10 minutes.  

Combine cheese, light mayo and garlic, stirring well.  Spread a scant 1/2 teaspoon cheese mixture over each dough piece.  Top each tartlet with about 2 tomato slices and 2 bell pepper rings.  Bake 400 degrees F for about 15 minutes or until dough is lightly browned.  Remove from oven and sprinkle evenly with thyme.  Enjoy!

Click here for a printable version of this recipe 

So another fun thing that happened??

SNOW!!!

Yep we finally had our first snow of the season {...bout time} and it was soo pretty.  I was hoping we'd have a white Christmas this year, but hey better late than never!  I took these off my balcony last night, oh how I adore winter.

Hope everyone is enjoying their 2012 so far!
Stay warm and cozy!