Winter Fruit Salad with Parmesan Puff Pastry Croutons -- how long does puff pastry last?

Winter Fruit Salad, minus the figs and cranberries. Parmesan Puff Pastry Croutons (below) were served on the side.

I meant to make this salad a couple days ago and started it by thawing the puff pastry at room temperature per package directions. When push came to shove, I skipped the salad, stuffed the pastry in a bag and stowing it in the fridge, where it stayed for two days.

Not sure what I'd find, I opened to find the puff pastry didn't have a weird smell or any serious wet spots, which is what I really feared.

Here's the contorted puff pastry inside a plastic bag.

Puff pastry removed from bag, uncrinkled and unfolded. It was a little more sticky than usual.

So I sprinkled the puff pastry lightly with flour, enough so it wouldn't stick to the rolling pin too badly.

The puff pastry was transferred to parchment paper and rolled out with a pin.

That bottom right corner was pretty sticky -- I should've floured the corners better.

While the pastry was a bit sticky, I proceeded with the recipe as described to yield these delicious bits of puffy goodness:

Neither of us could tell a difference between these and the "fresh" croutons I'd made previously.  Therefore, puff pastry can be thawed on the counter top and refrigerated for two days before it's used!

The salad was good, but it was weird not having ANY bits of fig or cranberry.  Next time, I'll use the figs and cranberries but will cut the figs smaller and sprinkle both on top of the apples and pears.

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