so for some reason today, i was reading through emails that i'd sent to tommy, friends and family when i was in italy. in one of the emails i'd talked about a party we went to very early on in the year, a potluck. the girls and i were poor, had no idea how to cook, and didn't know what the hell to bring.

but someone came up with the brilliant idea of making baked brie. it was super easy: we just needed cheese and filo dough and we were totally set. if you've ever had to make a last minute appetizer or something to bring to a party, you might have done baked brie. it's the easiest thing out there and people always love it.

i didn't have a party to go to tonight (except my own personal pity party i'm throwing myself on occasion of my 22mile death run tomorrow morning), but i felt like making baked brie. one, cause it's yummy, and two, cause i am obsessed with cheese. it's literally my favorite food.

anyway here's my little recipe:

you need filo dough (or actually, pillsbury crescent dough things work really well too) and a chunk of brie. and maybe something to put on top. you can make baked brie either sweet or salty, depending on what you put on it. i usually go for sweet, but i've seen recipes with prosciutto or pesto or nuts, etc. today i went for sliced pears for one minibaked brie and this awesome fig spread from whole foods for the other. and you need an egg white.

all you've got to do is lay out the filo dough, plop the brie in the middle, put your topping on top (oh yeah, strawberry jam is a good one too), wrap the filo dough up by sticking the corners together, brush the outside with the egg white, put the concoction on a slightly buttered baking dish, and bake it for about 15 minutes at 350.

for parties, you can get a big old wheel of brie and wrap it up. for my personal minibaked bries, i used only a wedge, sliced lengthwise through the middle, with the rind face down on the dough.