This evening is brought to you by insomnia baking

I attempted to go to sleep ridiculously early. This did not work.
Instead, after contemplating my sins for a good 2 hours, I got up and made these:

Savory Tasty-Pie Things.

* 1 sheet of puff pastry, thawed (I know, I suck. I didn’t make my own this time.)
* Candied Tomatoes (Recipe and cheating version follows)
* Herbed Yogurt Cheese (Recipe and cheating version follows)
* 1 egg, farm fresh. ( This is Portland, kids. )
* salt, dried basil + oregano + god knows what else

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees when you think the apartment will not melt from turning the oven on. In the middle of Portland summer, this is about 10:30pm. Turn on OPB’s In House, it’ll keep you company. Feed the cat because he’s going to want to keep you company too. (Turns out.)

Grab a baking sheet, throw the puff pastry sheet down on it. Cut it into 3rds and 3rds again so that you have an equal number of squares. If they kindof match in size, you should have been a Math major in school.

Add: 1 spoonful of yogurt cheese on each bottom piece. Make a volcano out of that, add the candied tomatoes on top. Top with the other semi-matching piece of puff pastry. Smoosh it together to seal the edges, stab with knife so that they don’t do something untoward in the oven. Break an egg, separate the yolk out and whisk it with a little water. Brush on top of your completed tart-things.
Sprinkle salt, dried basil and dried oregano over the top.

Bake for 15 minutes. During that 15 minutes, do the following: clean up the kitchen, microwave the egg white with a little salsa because the reason you weren’t sleeping was because you were starving and made a pot of coffee at 4:30, and clean up your disaster of a kitchen. Sing along with the Decemberists.

Yes, I had a hankering for Random Order’s Savory Hand Pies at 10:30pm and knowing they were closed, I faked it.

When the house smells really good and the kitchen is super hot, you’re done. (15 minutes, like I said.) Pull them out, admire and wait 5 minutes before devouring one.

Remains to be seen if my office will see this post and beg for some tomorrow.

Candied Tomatoes:
Roast a few handfuls of grape tomatoes with kosher salt and olive oil at about 350 degrees until they are all crispy and delicious.
Cheating version: sun-dried tomatoes in oil from wherever you can find them.

Herbed Yogurt Cheese:
Stir together 1 pint of homemade whole milk yogurt with 1 tsp kosher salt and 1 Tbsp oregano/ other favorite seasoning. (Yes, I know I’m a freak, I’ll do another post on the making of the yogurt, but just cope for a moment.) Suspend in cheesecloth, strain for as long as you can stand.
Cheating version: softened cream cheese with salt and oregano.