Spiced Apple & Blackberry Pastries

Ingredients

• Ready rolled puff pastry
• 3 small red apples
• Large handful of blackberries
• 2 tablespoons of maple syrup
• 1 teaspoon of vanilla essence
• 150g mascarpone cheese
• 1 egg and drop of milk for egg wash
• Icing sugar for dusting (optional)

Method

1. Chop apples into small, half cm, chunks and pop into a heavy based sauce pan with blackberries, 1tbsp maple syrup and 1.5tbsp water
2. Bring to simmer and allow to cook for 15 minutes, stirring occasionally so nothing sticks. The apples should go nice and soft and the blackberries should break down. Leave to one side to cool and thicken. 
3. Preheat oven to 200°C.
4. Pop your mascarpone cheese into a bowl with 1tbsp maple syrup and 1 tsp vanilla extract. Mix together until all combined but be careful not to overmix as the cheese may become to runny. Pop in the fridge until needed.
5. Unroll your puff pastry and divide into 12 squares/oblongs. In half of them, cut out little star shapes or any other shapes you have. This will be the top of your pastries so you only way to cut out little shapes and not too close to the edges and you will need around a cm spare to seal. 
6. Once your apple filling has cooled, divide between the 6 squares of pastries that haven’t had any shapes cut out of them. Be careful to leave at least a cm all around the edge to seal later on. 
7. Bring your sweetened cheese out of the fridge and add a nice scoop to each of your pastries, in the middle of your apple filling. 
8. Brush a little water around the edge of your pastry and stretch over your top part that has the cut out shapes. Press down around the edges firmly and then use a fork to flute the edge and create a nice seal. Repeat with all of your pastries. 
9. Pop onto a baking tray lined with non stick baking paper and brush over the top of each with your egg wash. 
10. Bake in the middle of your oven for 15-25 minutes until a nice golden brown. Once cooled, dust with a little Icing sugar if you wish.