This post is part of fellow book blogger, Beth Fish Reads‘, weekly meme (a “community” blog post, for all those non-bloggers out there) called Weekend Cooking.

I took a break from Weekend Cooking last weekend because I was busy with my youngest brother’s wedding! So, I’m just now posting about our Thanksgiving. We always get together with my Aunt, Uncle, and cousins for the holiday and everyone generally contributes a dish. This year, we were planning to keep things low-key with oysters on the grill and pick-up food since the wedding festivities were starting the next day. However, when we showed up at my Aunt’s, we were greeted with a full Thanksgiving dinner! What a treat. We had turkey, oyster stuffing, oysters on the grill, salad, ham biscuits, a savory apple cranberry cobbler, and two delicious desserts (a to-die-for caramel chocolate tart and pumpkin cheesecake with cranberry topping) courtesy of my cousin’s husband.

I’ve always contributed the appetizer…baked brie in puff pastry. I love this dish for entertaining because it looks really gourmet and complicated, but is actually very easy to make! This recipe originally started with my mom…and I’m sure she got it from someone else, but I sort of lost the trail at my mom.

Baked Brie in Puff Pastry
1 7-inch round of brie (do not substitute wedges or cheese will run everywhere),
*you can also use a smaller round of brie and cut the topping recipe in half, which is what I did in the pictures above.
6 tablespoons of unsalted butter
6 tablespoons of brown sugar
2 tablespoons of honey
1 small package of pecan pieces
1 package of frozen Pepperidge Farm pastry sheets (thawed, do not substitute pastry shells)
1 egg
A splash of water

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Combine butter, brown sugar, and honey in microwave-safe bowl. Microwave mixture until butter is melted. Stir mixture until sugar is combined with butter into a smooth texture. Stir in pecan pieces.

Unfold 1 sheet of thawed puff pastry onto a cookie sheet (I covered the cookie sheet in foil in the above picture, but it stuck…better to go without foil). Cut small triangles off each corner of the pastry depending on the size of your brie round (cut triangles off for 7 inch brie round, do not cut triangles off for a larger round). Put brie round into middle of pasty sheet. Fold edges of pastry up, forming a bowl around the brie. Pour butter mixture on top of brie, being careful not to let it run over the edges of the pastry sheet. Lay 2^nd pastry sheet over the top, cut triangles from the corners, and fold edges underneath the brie.

Optional Egg Wash (adds that pretty golden sheen to pastry crust)
Mix the egg (beaten) with the splash of water, forming an “egg wash”. Brush the egg wash all over the pastry with a pastry brush.

Bake brie in oven for approximately 12 minutes or until golden. Serve with Carr’s water crackers.