Almost once a week, I either host or attend a “tea party” with my mom, my sister, my great-nanny, my kids, and occasionally other random guests.  By “tea party,” I mean we brew a couple pots of English breakfast tea, serve some kind of pastry dish, like cookies or scones or butterhorns or even crumpets, and all sit around in somebody’s living room drinking tea and chatting.

It’s quite lovely, really.  And very British of us, although I have to say that we recently had our cousins from England over here, and I had them to tea, only to discover that they quite rarely have a tea party across the pond.  Tea is just more commonplace for them, something they drink at home all day.

Like I do.  But I’m kind of a weird American.  Most people drink coffee in the morning. (I do both- three kids, you know?  I need it.)

I’m headed to tea at my mom’s this afternoon, so I very quickly threw together these cherry danishes.  They took minutes to make because I used frozen puff pastry, so really all I had to do was assemble them very quickly and bake them off.

They are beautiful and delicious- flaky pastry, slightly tart but sweet cream cheese, and sweet red cherries.  A perfect brunch or tea item.

Enjoy!

Ingredients:
1 sheet frozen puff pastry, thawed
4oz cream cheese, room temperature
3 tablespoons powdered sugar
1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/4 teaspoon lemon juice
15oz can of cherry pie filling
egg wash (1 egg + 2 tablespoons water whisked together)
raw sugar for sprinkling/decoration

Directions:
Preheat the oven to 425° and line a pan with parchment paper.

Cut your puff pastry sheet into nine equal squares and fold all 4 edges of each square slightly up.

Beat together your cream cheese, powdered sugar, vanilla, and lemon juice until smooth.  Spoon a tablespoon of this mixture into the center of each pastry and spread it around.  Top that with about 4-5 cherries from the cherry pie filling.

Brush the edges of the pastry with egg wash, and sprinkle with raw sugar.  Bake 15-20 minutes until the pastry is golden brown.  Enjoy.