Thin puff pastry layers with crunch of sugar and juicy fragrant apples baked inside, served with custard and vanilla ice cream, sounds like a great combination for an indulgent dessert. This dessert is a speciality dish from Austria very famously made in one of its cities, Vienna. So here is Dish 6 from the World Cuisine Series from Austria. It is a pastry based dessert made with apples, puff pastry and other dry nuts. Strudel apparently is a word from German language. Traditionally, homemade strudel is a rolled pastry with fillings inside. The first time I tried it, I made it in the traditional way (few photos included from v1). The next time I tried it I made it into a cross between a French apple galette and an Austrian apple strudel, looks exotic and is super scrumptious. This is a very decadent dessert, go easy on the portions but enjoy it once in a while.
I have also tried making puff pastry at home it turns out well but to keep this recipe simple try and use ‘all-butter’ store bought organic puff pastry sheets or dough which will make this a super quick dessert. If you are wondering what puff pastry is, it is a type of pastry dough which is used to make aloo puffs sold in Indian bakeries. It is flour mixed with butter into a dough and then layered by rolling it multiple times folding over. Making this at home requires patience and advanced skills in baking. You can buy puff pastry sheets in super markets in frozen section or order them online. Rest of the ingredients are available easily everywhere.
- 1 apple
- ½ Tbsp brown sugar or regular granulated sugar
- ½ Tbsp demerera sugar or regular granulated sugar
- ½ Tsp cinnamon powder
- 1 pinch freshly grated nutmeg
- ¼ Tsp all spice powder (optional)
- ½ Tbsp golden syrup (optional) or honey
- 1 Tbsp fresh orange juice
- 2-3 Tbsp mixed raisins
- 1 Tbsp broken cashews
- 9 X 5 puff pastry sheet or as required
- Melted butter to brush on top
- Flowing custard as required
- Vanilla Ice cream
- Cut an apple into halves, deseed it and discard the hard ends. Chop up the apples into bite sized pieces
- Add raisins and broken cashews
- Add cinnamon powder, nutmeg and all spice
- Add sugar
- Add golden syrup and orange juice
- Mix well. This is the filling
- Pre-heat oven to 180 Deg C. Roll out the thawed puff pastry dough or open up the thawed rolled puff pastry (see notes)
- Cut into 3 equal parts out of the 9 X 5 puff pastry sheet to get individual 3 X 5 rectangles
- Spoon apple mixture onto the centre of each pastry sheet
- Bring the ends together from either side diagonally as shown
- Brush with melted butter
- Bake in 180 Deg C oven for 20-25 minutes (middle rack) till the puff pastry is golden and crisp
- Serve warm with chilled custard, ice cream
The puff pastry can be even rolled into a log with the filling and then baked
Do not overload the pastries with the filling. If you have leftover serve it separately with leftover custard next day or make into apple jam by just blending it together and cooking till it turns jammy
Add any spices you like but cinnamon is the most common and goes very well with apples
Use regular granulated sugar if you do not have brown or demerera sugar
The recipe can be easily doubled
Work with puff pastry quickly, if frozen thaw overnight in fridge or 2 hours at room temperature but work quickly so that the dough does not stick to your hands
Use freshly squeezed lemon/lime juice in place of orange juice, this is just to provide a little tartness to the sweet apples
Make filling ahead of time and refrigerate, make custard ahead of time and chill it. This way you can assemble the dessert in minutes and do other work when it bakes
Stepwise:
Cut an apple into halves, deseed it and discard the hard ends. Chop up the apples into bite sized pieces
Add raisins and broken cashews
Add cinnamon powder, nutmeg and all spice
Add sugar
Add golden syrup and orange juice
Mix well. This is the filling
Pre-heat oven to 180 Deg C. Roll out the thawed puff pastry dough or open up the thawed rolled puff pastry (see notes)
Cut into 3 equal parts out of the 9 X 5 puff pastry sheet to get individual 3 X 5 rectangles
Spoon apple mixture onto the centre of each pastry sheet
Bring the ends together from either side diagonally as shown
Brush with melted butter
Bake in 180 Deg C oven for 20-25 minutes (middle rack) till the puff pastry is golden and crisp
Serve warm with chilled custard, ice cream
