Frozen Puff Pastry is a wonderful thing. Many a time it has bailed me out of culinary dilemmas, helping to create fabulous tarts, interesting accoutrements, or sublime nests on which to rest entrees. Well this weekend puff pastry did it again, in a simple yet delicious manner I was able to make fresh morning pastries.

On a beautiful Sunday morning, the full day laying before me with errands to run and work to get jump-started on, I still wanted a bit of something special. Scouring the refrigerator and freezer for something to make, eggs were too heavy, waffles weren’t doing it for me, but maybe that lone box of frozen puff pastry would do the trick. Why can’t this box hold the key to my morning time delights?

I set to work assembling my pastries. I tucked in shards of dark chocolate, making a sort of pain au chococolat. Dried peaches were simmered and reconstituted, then rolled neatly in triangular pieces of dough, croissant style. Egg-washed, then dusted lightly with cinnamon-sugar, and baked for 20 minutes, the pastries were golden brown, and puffed to a glorious finish.

The pastries were light and buttery. The croissants were crisp, the pain au chocolat, decadent. It is true these pastries did not have the heft or substantiality of your traditional morning buns, but eaten still-warm from the oven, and enjoyed with a cup of dark, rich coffee, the pastries proved to be just the food for the lazy man’s weekend breakfast.