CHEESEBOARD PINWHEELS

CHEESE-BORED? You’ll love these for your next wine and cheese night!

I love a good cheeseboard. I don’t know about you but whenever I one is in front of me, I end up creating bites that I eat over and over again—cracker with a smear of cheese, topped with a grape, and then some honey. Something like that. So I decided to take some of my favorite flavors from an awesome board I created (see it here on Instagram) and transform them into a sort of “cheeseboard bite”. WHAT A SUCCESS! Paired with a great glass of wine, these are the perfect wine and cheese night bites and a fantastic show stopping dish to have at a chic party.

TO NOTE: The recipe calls for pizza dough. You can surely use store bought dough (or buy some from your favorite pizza shop—just ask at the counter) OR you can make my easy Homemade Pizza Dough recipe that I used to make these pinwheels.

On that dough note, if you want more of a pull-apart bread style here where there are less gaps between the pinwheels and fluffier flakier dough, you can absolutely try swapping pastry dough for the pizza dough. I plan on trying another version of this with a different combination of flavors and pastry dough. When I do, I’ll make sure to add a link here.

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CHEESEBOARD PINWHEELS

Yield: 14 Pinwheels

Author: Michelle Williams

Prep time: 10 MinCook time: 20 MinTotal time: 30 Min

Ingredients

FOR THE FILLING

• Blue Cheese (1/2 pound, crumbled. I crumbled mine directly from a block)
• Honey Crisp Apple (3/4. peeled and finely diced)
• Walnut Halves (1/2 cup, finely chopped)
• Fresh Tarragon (1 tablespoon, chopped. save a tiny bit for topping)
• Salt (to taste)

FOR EVERYTHING ELSE

• Bread or All-Purpose Flour (a little for dusting your work surface)
• Homemade Pizza Dough (or store bought)
• Butter or Butter Spray (for greasing your baking pan)
• Extra Virgin Olive Oil (1 tablespoon)
• Coarse Sea Salt (1/2 teaspoon)
• Honey (for drizzling over the top to your liking)

KITCHEN ITEMS

• Medium Mixing Bowl
• Cutting Board
• Chefs Knife
• Rolling Pin
• 8 Inch Pie Pan
• Pastry Brush
• Butter Knife
• Round Serving Plate (that's bigger than your pinwheels)

Instructions

TO MAKE YOUR FILLING

1. In your mixing bowl, fully and evenly combine your crumbled blue cheese, honey crisp apple, walnuts, and tarragon.
2. Season with a little salt to taste.

TO MAKE YOUR PINWHEELS

1. Lightly flour a clean work surface (like your counter).
2. Place your pizza dough down on the floured area and use your rolling pin to roll it until it’s evenly 1/4 inch thick and at least 16 x 7 inches.
3. Use your chefs knife to cut out a long rectangle—roughly 15 x 6 inches. Discard the rest of your dough.
4. Leaving roughly 1/4 inch from all of the edges, press your blue cheese filling on your dough. Don’t press so hard that your filling breaks through your dough BUT do try to flatten it as much as possible so that you have a thin layer that’s no more than 1/4 inch thick.
5. Width-wise, use your hands to tightly roll your dough into a spiral. Like a Swiss Roll if that helps visually.
6. Use your chefs knife to cut off the uneven/unstuffed end of your dough to make sure you have a perfectly even end. For the time being, do this only to your starting end. Like a tube of toothpaste, your filling may slightly push toward the back end while you cut your pinwheels.
7. Horizontally, cut roughly 1 inch thick pinwheels—you should end up with 14 even pieces. You can use your knife to score lines in your dough to use as a guide if you want to visualize the even spacing of your cuts.
8. Cut off any uneven edge on the end of the last piece of your roll.

TO BAKE YOUR PINWHEELS

1. preheat your oven to 350º.
2. Grease pie pan with butter or butter spray.
3. One by one, place your pinwheels cut-side-up so that they just touch each other around the inner-edge of your pie pan—about 9 of them. Then start a second circle inside of the first circle—using about 4 of them. Then place your remaining pinwheel in the very middle of your pie pan.
4. Use your pastry brush to lightly brush olive oil over any exposed part of dough.
5. Bake for 10 minutes. If when you take your pie pan out of the oven you see enough liquid that there is some pooling, carefully pour as much of it as possible out. This liquid happens because of all of the moisture in the fruit and cheese.
6. Turn your heat to 475º.
7. Sprinkle a pinch of coarse salt over your pinwheels.
8. Bake until your dough is golden and you have a little blackening on some of the edges—about an additional 10 minutes.
9. Use a butter knife to help loosen your pinwheels from the pan. To do this, gently run it between the inner-edge of the pie pan and your pinwheels. If you are able to stick it under your rolls as well, do it carefully.
10. Transfer your pinwheels to your serving plate. TO DO THIS: Place a clean firm cutting board on top of your pie pan (covering all of your pinwheels). Put one hand firmly on your cutting board and the other hand on your pie pan. Holding your pie pan and cutting board tightly together flip them over so that your pinwheels now sit on your cutting board. Remove your pie pan (you are now done with it). Pick up your serving plate and place it face down on the pinwheels (on the side that is currently up. It is going to flip again and be their bottom). Again, hold your cutting board in one hand and now your serving plate in the other, hold them tightly together, and flip. Your pinwheels should now be face up on your serving plate.
11. Sprinkle your remaining tarragon over your pinwheels.
12. Drizzle honey to your liking over your pinwheels.
13. Optional: sprinkle on a tiny bit more coarse salt.

Notes

This doesn't include the time if you're making Homemade Pizza Dough. You can make my easy pizza dough recipe, buy store bought pizza dough, or even use puff pastry dough.

Did you make this recipe?

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