December 3, 2003

Gingerbread men and sleighs decorated with colored sugar? Not for Cherotree, where the holiday "cookie" trays evolved to include everything but cookies. Imagine little squares of dense, fudge-frosted fudge cake.tiny marzipan tarts with apricot glaze.lace horns.bite-sized baklava in syrup flavored with lemon and rose water.

In the early sixties, my "new" mother-in-law brought me a few pounds of butter "for my Christmas baking". Christmas baking? A new concept, as my own mother baked a fruitcake and a couple of pies for the big dinner and that was about it. I plunged right in, making Christmas cookies one year and candies the next, sending them to everyone on my list. In my most ambitious year, I made 100 dozen cookies. (Easter cookies, anyone?)

Years later, when I started catering, it was a natural progression to mingle my cookie baking with dessert requirements, especially at holiday time. Most holiday catering consisted of buffets with finger foods, and although each menu was individually planned, they all ended with the phrase "Holiday Desserts".

My system was one you might adapt if you do a lot of entertaining: throughout the season my freezer was stocked with a half dozen different desserts in one or two-bite sizes. Usually a selection of 3-5 was served at each function. For example, at a gold record celebration for CBS Records I served an exceptionally beautiful assortment of only three desserts: the marzipan tarts mentioned above, powdered sugar-dusted mock strudel slices in foil cups and fudge truffles.

When the freezer ran out of, say, a chocolate dessert, it would be replaced with either the same recipe or another chocolate dessert. Preserving a variety of flavors, textures, colors and shapes was like fitting a jigsaw puzzle: no more than one could have chocolate or nuts or fruit or be a bar cookie or tart or whatever. The exception was when all the desserts were tarts with varied fillings, e.g., lemon butter (also known as lemon curd or lemon cheese), jelly-glazed strawberries and pecan "tassies".

Of all the desserts over the years, my favorite is Baklava. The traditional slices were much too large for my purposes, but I found a recipe for Rolled Baklava. It called for rolling several sheets of filo* pastry around the filling, cutting slices diagonally through the top and baking several rolls whole on each baking sheet. The rolls were then cut all the way through after baking and soaked in syrup, providing about 6 dozen individual pieces of Baklava that were served in paper candy cups.

After years of using this recipe, I thought of something even simpler: filling those tiny filo tart shells in the grocer's freezer with pecans, baking and adding syrup. This is the recipe included below. Easy to make, delicious, and impressive. I'll bet you could make your reputation on this one alone.

*Filo is also spelled phyllo and fillo, but I opt for economy of letters.

Ideas for Holiday Dessert Trays

Note: The miniature filo tart shells are also good for appetizers. Any hot dip may be served in them, or even baked in them. I used to do Shrimp Newburg Tarts with scratch pastry, but now use the tart shells for a lot less hassle. The faithful hot artichoke dip (chopped artichokes, garlic, mayo, Parmesan) and any seafood/dairy mixture are quite good fillings. Fill with hot filling or fill and bake just before serving.

Baklava Tarts

When I found this syrup recipe in a Greek cookbook, I knew I had found my ideal baklava: no cinnamon, cloves or honey! A bottle of rose water may be purchased in gourmet shops or by mail; it is not expensive and lasts a very long time. The filo tart shells come in packages of 15, and the syrup recipe will be enough to do 30 or 45 tarts. Be sure to save the packages to store the tarts in.

2 or 3 packages frozen filo tart shells
Pecans, toasted and finely chopped
Sugar

Syrup:
1/2 cup water
1 1/4 cup sugar
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1 tablespoon rose water

Set tart shells on a baking sheet. Fill each one to heaping with chopped nuts and top with a half teaspoon of sugar. Bake about 25 minutes at 325 degrees, or until the pastry is lightly colored.

While the pastry is baking, make the syrup. Boil the water, sugar and lemon juice, and simmer until thick enough to coat a spoon. Add rose water and simmer one minute.

Push the pastries to one end of the pan so they are touching-you need them close together so the syrup doesn't spread all over the pan. Ladle hot syrup over. Cool. To store for a few days at room temperature, place them back in the plastic trays the pastry came in, or in a single layer in a covered container. May also be frozen for a week or two if you stick the original trays in plastic freezer bags.

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