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These fun Mini Pastry Wrapped Cranberry Baked Brie Bites are my favorite last-minute appetizer. They’re quick, easy, and most importantly, everyone loves them! Puff pastry, creamy brie, and quick homemade cranberry jam all baked together to create the perfect cheese-filled mini pastries. Finish each cute bite off with fresh sage for a festive appetizer that’s perfect for holiday entertaining.
Thanksgiving wouldn’t be complete without some melty Brie. It’s without a doubt one of my favorite easy appetizers to serve over the holidays. For the last four years, I’ve made either my cranberry brie pull apart bread or my cranberry brie tarts to enjoy on Thanksgiving. Some years I’ll even add my sweet, cinnamon sugar cranberry brie pastry swirls.
This year, however, things are looking a little different. I think we can all agree that everyone is being extra precautions about avoiding germs. SO, with that in mind, I wanted to make sure each and every Thanksgiving appetizer I share is personalized and bite-size. My thinking is that with these bites, no one should be touching anything but their own food. I LOVE a huge wheel of baked brie served with crackers for scooping. But if you’re worried about others touching your food, make these instead.
They might even be better than a big wheel of melty brie. Personalized means no sharing. Plus, I doubled up on the brie. You can never have too much brie, you know?
Jumping right into the details today because guys, these bites are simple and don’t need a lot of hype to build them up. Again, nothin really beats melty brie cheese.
Alight, so start with the cranberry jam. This is the easiest to throw together. You just need fresh cranberries, brown sugar…to help offset the cranberries’ tartness, orange juice and zest, and a touch of cinnamon. Bring everything to a boil on the stove. Then simmer ten or so minutes until it’s thickened down.
It’s basically thickened up cranberry sauce, which is even more delicious.
I mentioned the other day that one of my go-to shortcut ingredients is puff pastry. I kind of love it. Puff pastry is great for quick dinners, beyond delicious appetizers, and sweet desserts.
The one thing I love using puff pastry the most for however, brie. Brie and puff pastry are like peanut butter and jelly. They’re delicious on their own, but better together (really throwing out all the cheesy lines today).
Once the jam is made, lay the sheet of pastry out and cut it into mini rectangles. Top each with a sizeable cube of brie, then spoon the jam over the brie. Lay a sheet of pastry over the jam, then pinch each bite to seal everything up inside.
Throw the bites into the oven, bake for a bit, and done!
Quick, easy, and truly just about perfect.
Once you pull these out of the oven, you’ll know immediately that each bite is going to be delicious. Some of the brie and cranberry jam will be bursting out from the top and sides. The kitchen will have a sweet buttery smell to it, and you’ll want to serve these up right away.
Immediately, these are definitely best enjoyed warm right out of the oven, with a sprinkling of flaky sea salt, and a drizzle of honey.
Delicious, and definitely one of those appetizers that you’ll have a hard time turning down. My best tip? Double the recipe. Most guests will enjoy two…at the very least!
Almost! You can fully assemble each bite, then keep them chilled in the fridge until ready to bake. When almost ready to serve, simply throw the pan into the oven.
Easy, right? But so very GOOD. It’s hard to beat these bites. They’re classic, but with a fun twist that I swear makes them even more delicious. I can pretty much guarantee that if you put these on your appetizer table, every last bite will be gone in minutes.
Already excited to make them again soon for my family’s Thanksgiving!!
Looking for other easy Thanksgiving appetizers?? Here are my favorites:
Cranberry Brie Pull Apart Bread
Goat Cheese Stuffed Bacon Wrapped Dates with Rosemary Honey
How to Make an Easy Holiday Cheese Board
Lastly, if you make these Pastry Wrapped Cranberry Baked Brie Bites, be sure to leave a comment and/or give this recipe a rating! Above all, I love to hear from you guys and always do my best to respond to each and every comment. And of course, if you do make this recipe, don’t forget to tag me on Instagram! Looking through the photos of recipes you all have made is my favorite!
Nutritional information is only an estimate. The accuracy of the nutritional information for any recipe on this site is not guaranteed.
Served these as an appetizer on Thanksgiving Day and they were amazing! Next time, we’ll definitely put some more coarse sugar on top (we skimped a little to make it “healthier” but the full amount would’ve been perfect).
Hey Sneha,
Thanks so much for giving the recipe a try, I am so glad it was enjoyed! Happy New Year! xTieghan
Omg what. So good. So easy and so good. I took out the step to make the cranberry jam and used a high end chile raspberry ginger jam with a sprinkle of sage in each pocket as well. Boyfriend so impressed. So am I! Yum.
Hey Alyssa,
Thanks so much for giving the recipe a try, I am thrilled that it worked out for you. Happy Holidays! xTieghan
Hi Tieghan,
Can I use Cranberry Sauce that comes in a tin (Ocean Spray). I have one leftover from Thanksgiving, so thought of using it up.
Thank you
Naina
Hey Naina,
Yes, that will work. I hope you love the recipe, please let me know if you have any other questions! Happy Holidays! xTieghan
Hi! Thinking of making these for Christmas Eve appetizers. The store was out of puff pastry, will pie crust work? Also thoughts on making them smaller, like bite sized? Thanks!!
Hey Kat,
Yes both of these will work! I hope you love the recipe, please let me know if you have any other questions! Happy Holidays! xTieghan
Hi friend! I’ve made the bite size using crescent rolls! You can buy the crescent dough sheet to make life easier, but my store only had the originals. I just pressed the seams together. After that I cut them into 24 squares. I used a mini muffin pan, & then placed my brie along with canned whole berry cranberry sauce! They were a hit, & the perfectly amazing bite!!! Hope this helps!!!
Is there a dry herb I can supplement for the sage?
Hey Liz,
Rosemary would be great here! I hope you love the recipe, please let me know if you have any other questions. Happy Holidays! xTieghan
People have mentioned the oozing of brie during baking. I just use a mini muffin tin, add the Brie and apricot preserves to a 3” square of the puff pastry that I have inserted into the muffin pan, and pinch the corners of the pastry together to make a package. I freeze them until I need them. Recently I made them a week in advance and froze them until the day of my party. When I take them out of the freezer, I just brush them with an egg wash and bake them for 25 minutes at 425. The result is that all the Brie bites are a uniform size and they are every bit as delicious. I let them cool and use a spatula to release them from the mold in the mini muffin pan. No excess Brie or jam. It’s in there! There wasn’t a Brie bite left!
Thanks so much for sharing Karen!!
These were good but didn’t work out quite like I imagined they would. The cranberry jam is stellar and I’ll save it to use for thanksgiving in the future but I couldn’t detect the sage at all which was a little bit of a bummer bc I looooooove sage. I could (of course) try it again and double or triple the amount. I’m really not an expert on using puff pastry so maybe it’s me but I found that the dough got very warm and sticky quite quickly so I had to keep putting it back in the fridge to make it more manageable. Also bc of the filling the top portion of the pastry was too small to cover the bottom one – I eventually figured out that I could lightly stretch the top piece and that made the parts match better. The base of this recipe is great but I would make a couple changes if I worked with it again: for one thing they are quite large like palm size not bite size so I would def scale them down (I was looking for something that was more of an appetizer size – these were a bit more of a commitment), also I found that these leaned more towards the sweet side – This is what I found the most surprising! I imagined these to be savory with a hint of sweetness and tartness but more Brie forward. Maybe it’s bc of the added sugar on top of the pastry or maybe I used too much cranberry jam (or two much sugar in the jam – I went with 3 Tbsp) but these were more of a dessert to me. If I gave these another go I would make them smaller and maybe sprinkle the pastry with salt instead of sugar.
Hey Beata,
Thanks for giving the recipe a try! Yes, puff pastry can be difficult to work with if it is not super cold. xTieghan
Beata, you don’t need to sprinkle the top with anything because they are sweet enough! If the dough gets too sticky just add a pinch of flour to the cutting board to reduce stickiness. Better yet: cut one sheet of dough into 12 squares (and don’t worry if they are not all the same size), and insert them individually into a mini muffin tin that you have sprayed with Pam. Do the same with the second pastry sheet so you will have a total of 24 Brie bites. Then drop in one piece of Brie (I use a 8 ounce round Brie) that I have cut into 24 pieces). Then spoon a 1/4 tsp of your favorite preserves on top of the Brie and pinch the four corners together. At that point you can either freeze or brush with an egg wash. Bake at 425 for 25 minutes or until golden brown. Let cool and remove from pan and watch them disappear. There is no magic to working with puff pastry. Once you get the hang of it you will want to put everything into puffed pastry!
These came out stupendous in taste and looks. My slits were a little bigger than yours which let the cranberries pop out a little. I served them with a Niçoise salad for lunch and my friends went crazy for them. Thank you for such an easy fab recipe. When cranberries are out of season could I use a fresh fruit compote or just berries. I noticed you suggested fig jam. That sounds good too.
Thank you so much Gail! I am really glad this turned out so well for you! xTieghan
OH MY WORD !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! These are delicious!!!!!!! EVERYONE NEEDS to make these!! No, wait!!! I don’t want to create a run on the puff pastry at the store!!!!! Seriously, these will be a permanent staple in my kitchen at cranberry time. Cranberry time is the Most Wonderful Time of The Year!!!!!!! Thank you for sharing this with us!!!!!
I am so happy this turned out so well for you, Nicole! Thank you! xTieghan
These were AMAZING! Two things: 1. I definitely wanted more than a teaspoon of cranberry sauce in each one. More like 2 tablespoons and 2. Drizzling honey over the top is a MUST. Yum! These were a favorite at Thanksgiving!
Thank you so much!! I am so happy these turned out so well for you Brookes! xTieghan
So happy to be able to still share Thanksgiving with my family during the pandemic because of recipes like this. I was able to prep and drop off servings for my family to finish and bake and it brought some togetherness, even though we weren’t in the same room. The cranberry jam is SO delicious. Next time, I’ll probably spread out the brie or cut it into smaller pieces as I found the pastry dough a little unforgiving with the sizes I was working with. These reminded me of DIY holiday poptarts and I’m excited to experiment with different flavors and cheeses.
So easy and they turned out absolutely delightful. Loved that I can kept them in freezer then heat up when ready!
Yes! Thank you so much Jodie! xTieghan
I made these for Thanksgiving and my family loves them!! The cranberry sauce flavor is so unique. A very easy to follow recipe that was fun!
Thank you so much Lindsey! xTieghan
I added leftover turkey and a touch on honey on the Brie and a safe leaf in each hand pie. Delicious use of leftovers!
Thank you so much Scarlett! xTieghan
Made these as an appetizer for Thanksgiving and they were so delicious! Super easy, especially if you are already planning on making fresh cranberry sauce for the table, and everyone loved them. Thanks so much for the recipe!
Thank you so much Samantha! I am really glad this recipe turned out so well for you! xTieghan
Wow, I don’t know what we did wrong on this one but it was nothing like the picture and not tasty at all. I used the full amount of brown sugar and the cranberry filling was still way too sour. The brie softened the bite a bit but not enough to want more.
I wonder if this actually called for pie crust dough rather than puff pastry. Despite rolling it out and egging the edges, our puff pastry didn’t want to stay together and was a mess to eat. Looking at the pictures, it sure looks like pie dough.
I’ve had great luck with every other HBH recipe I’ve tried, but this one not so much.
Hi Lizzie! I am sorry this recipe did not turn out well for you.. If there is anything I can help with, I would love to! Otherwise, I hope you enjoy some other recipes of mine! xTieghan