It happened again this week. My husband had a meeting and needed snacks for the group. We are at least 25 miles from a grocery store and I have the flu. Meaning, of course, I will have to use what I have on hand. I thought about this snack or that snack and didn't have one ingredient. I looked in my freezer and saw Rhodes loaf bread. I knew I could do something with that.
I took out the loaves, laid them on a cookie sheet to thaw--not rise-- and went about my day--thinking what I was going to do with them. Finally I looked in the refrigerator and saw a half pound of cream cheese and half a package of chopped dates. Now I think if you put those two ingredients together, you have a winner. I decided to make small bite size purses.
I allowed the cream cheese to soften, then mixed it with about half the chopped dates. It was a pretty stiff mixture, but I wanted it that way. Then I proceeded to work with my thawed--not risen--loaves of bread. I sliced the loaf in half crosswise--just like you were slicing bread. Then I sliced each half in half. Then I cut each quarter in half. Now I had eight thick biscuit like yeast dough on my board. I laid each one down flat and cut the eighth in thirds. This doesn't have to be perfect, but it seemed that 1/2 was too much dough, and 1/4 was too little.
Now I had 24 small yeast balls. I took each one and pulled it to stretch into a flat sheet. Remember this dough does better if you stretch it rather than trying to roll it out. When I was satisfied with the dough shape, I placed a teaspoon of cream cheese/date mixture in it and pulled the edges together. I placed each one in a mini-muffin cup and allowed to rise for about 30 minutes. Then I baked them at 350 degrees for about 20-25 minutes until golden brown. They were delicious. Remember you have combined fresh yeast bread, cream cheese, and dates. How can it get any better?
You could probably make these with yeast rolls, but you will still need to cut each ball of dough in half to balance the amount of yeast roll and filling.
I saw this recipe on one of the cooking shows and just had to try it. I made a few changes and served it to a group of ladies for appetizers. When I announced that dinner would be just a few more minutes, one of the ladies held up a date and said, "A few more of these and you can skip dinner." They were absolutely delicious. Here is my version. If you change it, please let me know so I can try yours.