Goats Cheese, Pecan and Spinach Rolls

Early this year I journeyed back to my home and I realised something. I had a terrible, and boring diet.
My love of food started when I arrived on this dry, red soil; of course there are many people to thank for this. But I’m unsure whether I could ever just pinpoint it to one person. It would probably be a combination of Maggie Beer, Joy the Baker, my mother and my boyfriends mother.
This brought me to realise; in the most round about and convoluted way that my top 5 favourite foods are new additions (mostly):
– Lemon (with black pepper? Of course!)
– A really thin base pizza with 3 toppings – tomato, mozzarella and basil
– The combination of Spinach and Rocket, as well as them being amazing on their own,
– Ice Cream (not specifically new, but I’ve found gelato and local creamers)
– Goats cheese (specifically the ashed goats cheese named Swag from Woodside Cheesewrights)
Just looking at the list I could make the most delicious meal. I’m still hedging out how to curb my ice cream addiction. It’s serious.

Your 20’s is a time for bad eating habits; ice cream for breakfast anyone? But also to recognise that maybe an entire pizza is going to make you want to vom. But seriously…Ice cream for breakfast?

So in keeping with delicious food; I made food. Food was good.
Food was Spinach, Pecan and Goats Cheese Rolls. With Easy Baby Beet Relish.
This is amazing, like super delicious and so easy. Super Easy. Super Duper Easy.

I used a mash up of goats cheese and ashed goats cheese, which gave this wonderful and subtle flavour. I feel like this goats cheese instead of the classic feta works much better; because spinach is such a slight flavour, this combination brings out that wonderful spinach flavour!

Rolls
3 sheets Frozen Puff Pastry (thawed)
1 large bunch of Spinach (steamed, drained and squeezed dry)
250g of Goats cheese
Handful of Pecans (chopped)
1 small Onion (diced)
1 egg
Milk for brushing

Lay the pastry out an hour or two before you start to thaw; they thaw quicker when separated.
This is just so easy! Mix all the ingredients; aside from the pastry and milk, in a bowl with a spoon. Keep it chunky.
If you want to be particular you can use a piping bag to disperse the mixture onto the thawed pastry or you could just use spoons.
Slice the pastry sheet in half. Pipe 4 small mounds spaced evenly about an inch from the edge of the pastry. I got 8 rolls out of each sheet of pastry. Roll the pastry around the filling and seal the ends with a touch of water. Pop these in the freezer while you heat the oven to 180°C.
Brush tops of rolls with milk and bake for 20 minutes, or until golden brown.
Deeeelicious.

Beetroot Relish/Jam
3 Baby beets cooked and grated (you can buy them already cooked)
2.5 tablespoons of Verjuice
1 Tablespoon of Brown Sugar
Quarter of a cup of Water

Literally just throw everything into a pan, stir and cook on a low heat for half an hour/hour until jammy.