Cranberry Goat Cheese Pastry Bites

by Sabrina Snyder

Published on Last updated

9 Comments

5 from 1 vote
30 Servings
Prep Time 5 minutes
Cook Time 20 minutes
Total Time 25 minutes
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Cranberry Goat Cheese Pastry Bites with just five ingredients are the easiest appetizers you’ll ever serve your guests. Perfect for the holidays!

Cranberry Goat Cheese Pastry Bites with just five ingredients are the easiest appetizers you'll ever serve your guests. Perfect for the holidays! Cranberry Goat Cheese Pastry Bites

Cranberry Goat Cheese Pastry Bites are such an easy appetizer. So much so we’ve been making them for two months straight for all our holiday, work, family and friend parties.

Puff pastry is basically the bread of the holidays, and with goat cheese and egg mixed with some thyme, we’ve got a fantastic bite your guests will love.

This is the last post of the year sponsored by Mountain Rose Herbs and I just wanted to give them a huge shoutout to say thanks! They’ve been super supportive all year long, they’ve allowed me to literally play with my food with an actual mountain’s worth of spices and they never once steered me in a direction the blog shouldn’t go in. They’re basically amazing. All the holiday love for them.

Today’s recipe is featuring their amazing organic, hand packed Thyme Leaves. The flavors are nothing like the herbs you buy in at your local grocer. They’re fresh and fragrant, perfect for these recipes.

Now, these pastry bites!! I have another one coming out tomorrow with blueberry and vanilla (think the goat cheese log from Trader Joe’s for a flavor inspiration) but these Cranberry Thyme Goat Cheese Bites are everything amazing about the holidays. We LOVE them.

Plus, they take exactly one minute to put together.

The easiest holiday appetizer you'll ever make. Goat Cheese Pastry Bites with cranberries.

Want more flavors you can enjoy the rest of the year?

  • Caramelized Onion Feta Pastry Bites (Copycat)
  • Tomorrow’s Blueberry Vanilla
  • Raspberry instead of Cranberry with a bit of lemon zest
  • Strawberry with orange zest (orange would also pair great with today’s cranberry jelly)

I’ve even made these in October using chunks of roasted pumpkin on top of the goat cheese mixture with some fresh thyme sprinkled over. A tiny drizzle of maple syrup (not even necessary) or plain, they were AMAZING – and they’ll be on the blog before the next time pumpkin season rolls around.

Some easy tips for these pastry bites:

  • I prefer to let puff pastry thaw in the fridge but if you’re in a hurry open it up on the cutting board and put a very lightly damp towel over it so it doesn’t dry out.
  • Spray your mini muffin tins before adding the pastry.
  • Add more filling than your gut tells you, if it is a bit of an overfill the pastry will bake up around it.
  • Get the lightest brown you can on the tops because the bottoms will be more browned.
  • If you didn’t add enough jam before baking add some more after they’re out of the oven.

Ready to bake in just five minutes, these Cranberry Goat Cheese Puff Pastry Bites are DELICIOUS!

Want to freeze these Cranberry Goat Cheese Pastry Bites?

Follow the directions up to right before you would put it into the oven. Freeze the bites for 2-3 hours then store in a ziploc bag. When ready to cook, put them into the muffin tins and bake for 20-22 minutes. Do not bake them without the mini muffin tins, the puff pastry will flatten into pancakes making a mess.

Want to make this into a slab? Keep the puff pastry in three large triangles. Score a rectangle shape a half inch from the border and fill with the goat cheese mixture and top with the cranberry jelly. Bake for 20-22 minutes. Directions can be found here.

Looking for more appetizer recipes?

Tools used in the making of these Cranberry Goat Cheese Pastry Bites:
Mini Muffin Tin: Make sure you’re using the right size, these are perfect for a one bite appetizer.

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Dinner, then Dessert

Cranberry Goat Cheese Pastry Bites

Cranberry Goat Cheese Pastry Bites with just five ingredients are the easiest appetizers you'll ever serve your guests. Perfect for the holidays!
Yield 30 Servings
Prep Time 5 minutes
Cook Time 20 minutes
Total Time 25 minutes
Course Appetizer
Cuisine American
Author Sabrina Snyder
Cranberry Goat Cheese Pastry Bites with just five ingredients are the easiest appetizers you'll ever serve your guests. Perfect for the holidays!
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Ingredients
 

  • 1/2 box Puff Pastry
  • 8 ounces goat cheese
  • 1/4 teaspoon Kosher salt
  • 1/4 teaspoon dried Mountain Rose Herbs thyme
  • 1 large egg
  • 1/2 cup whole cranberry jelly

Instructions

  • Preheat the oven to 400 degrees.
  • In a bowl whisk together the goat cheese, salt, thyme and egg.
  • Unfold the puff pastry rectangles and cut each three piece sheet into 30 squares.
  • Spray the mini muffin tin with cooking spray and put the puff pastry squares into each well.
  • Spoon in a scant tablespoon of cheese mixture into each well, then cover with about a half tablespoon of cranberry jelly.
  • Bake for 18-20 minutes.

Nutrition

Calories: 60kcal | Carbohydrates: 5g | Protein: 1g | Fat: 3g | Saturated Fat: 1g | Cholesterol: 8mg | Sodium: 61mg | Potassium: 10mg | Sugar: 2g | Vitamin A: 85IU | Vitamin C: 0.5mg | Calcium: 13mg | Iron: 0.3mg

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Cranberry Goat Cheese Pastry Bites with just five ingredients are the easiest appetizers you'll ever serve your guests. Perfect for the holidays!
Ready to bake in just five minutes, these Cranberry Goat Cheese Puff Pastry Bites are DELICIOUS!

About the Author: Sabrina Snyder

Sabrina is a professionally trained Private Chef of over 10 years with ServSafe Manager certification in food safety. She creates all the recipes here on Dinner, then Dessert, fueled in no small part by her love for bacon.

Sabrina Snyder is a professionally trained personal and private chef of over 10 years who is the creator and developer of all the recipes on Dinner, then Dessert.

She is also the author of the cookbook Dinner, then Dessert – Satisfying Meals Using Only 3, 5 or 7 Ingredients, published by Harper Collins.

She started Dinner, then Dessert as a business in her office as a lunch service for her coworkers who admired her lunches before going to culinary school and becoming a full time personal chef and private chef.

As a personal chef Sabrina would cook for families one day a week and cook their entire week of dinners. All grocery shopping, cooking and cleaning was done along with instructions on reheating. As a private chef she cooked for private parties and cooked in family homes in the evenings for families on a nightly basis after working as a personal chef during the day.

Sabrina has been certified as a ServSafe Manager since 2007 and was a longstanding member of the USPCA Personal Chef Association including being on the board of the Washington DC Chapter of Chefs in the US Personal Chef Association when they won Chapter of the year.

As a member of the community of food website creators Sabrina Snyder has spoken at many conferences regarding her experiences as a food writer including the Indulge Food Conference, Everything Food Conference, Haven Food Conference and IACP Annual Food Professionals Conference.

Sabrina lives with her family in sunny California.

See more posts by Sabrina

Dinner, then Dessert, Inc. owns the copyright on all images and text and does not allow for its original recipes and pictures to be reproduced anywhere other than at this site unless authorization is given. If you enjoyed the recipe and would like to publish it on your own site, please re-write it in your own words, and link back to my site and recipe page. Read my disclosure and copyright policy. This post may contain affiliate links.

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Comments

    1. They can be but as you know, I’m sure, don’t leave goat cheese out longer than 2 hours. Thanks for asking and let us know how yours turned out!

      Reply

  3. Hi!

    Im a huge fan of mixing sweet and savoury and was wondering if you can recommend another type of cheese that would work well with this recipe? (I dont eat goats cheese)

    Thanks!

    Reply

    1. Puff pastry has a tendency to have a cold fat mouth texture to it when it cools down too much. You could bake ahead then travel and reheat probably with just a small loss in taste or (what I would do) freeze the tray completely and put cold packs around it and bake it on arrival with 2-3 additional minutes since it will be frozen. Hope you have a wonderful Thanksgiving!

      Reply