It’s pumpkin season, and I saw that Pop Tarts made a pumpkin pie flavor! So naturally I had to make my own. I decided to try and make puff pastry. But I didn’t want to do the full puff pastry because I really don’t have the patience for that right now, so I did shortcut puff pastry… Although it didn’t feel like much of a shortcut haha. But It’s totally worth it! It’s so light and flakey. The recipe is inspired/based off of Mark Bittman’s How to Bake Everything. (Surprised?)
Ingredients:
Filling*
1 c canned or fresh pumpkin puree
2 tsp cinnamon
Dash of salt
1 tsp nutmeg
1/2 tsp ginger
1/4 tsp cardamum
1/4 tsp ground cloves
1/3 c granulated sugar
1/3 c brown sugar
Directions:
In a saucepan, mix all the ingredients together
Place it over medium low heat mixing periodically for about 10 minutes or until the mixture is smooth and glossy
Don’t forget to taste it as you go and add any spices or sugar until you like the flavor
Set it aside to cool
Icing**
2 c powdered sugar
1 tsp cinnamon
1/4 c non-diary milk
Directions:
Place the ingredients in a bowl, and mix by hand or with a hand mixer until all the ingredients are incorporated
Pastry:
4 sticks vegan butter (cold)
4 c flour
1 1/2 tsp salt
1 c ice cold water
Directions:
Reserve 1/2 of a stick of butter, cube the rest, and place the other 3 1/2 sticks in the freezer for about 10 minutes
Place the flour and salt in a bowl or a food processor and mix or process to mix it thoroughly
Add the 1/2 stick of butter and process or mix until there are little pea sized clumps of butter throughout the mixture
Add in the frozen butter and mix or process until the mixture has small pea sized clumps of butter covered by flour throughout the entire mixture
Pour in 1/4 c of the ice cold water and mix or pulse until well incorporated
At this point, feel the mixture to see if it needs more water. The flour should all be moist
If there are dry spots, add a little more water (the dough will still be fairly dry and crumbly, but should stick together when you press it together
Dump the mixture onto a large piece of parchment paper
Form the dough into a long 20 inch log
Place in the fridge for 30 minutes
Once chilled, pull out the dough and roll it out to be 20 inches by 10 inches (lightly flour your workspace so the dough doesn’t stick. If you have excess flour, just wipe it off)
Make a book fold (I have a visual in my YouTube video) fold the short end of the pastry to the middle and repeat on the other side (it will kind of look like a book that has pages that flip out) then fold that in half (kind of like closing a book)
Wrap it in plastic wrap and put in the fridge for another 30 minutes
Repeat this step one more but preferably two more times (so you have the best layers and puff possible)
To keep track of how many times you’ve laminated the dough, you can put a finger imprint in it for the first time, then two imprints for the second time, etc.
After you’ve laminated the dough for the second or third time (the last time before you shape and bake it) put it in the fridge for an hour
While it’s chilling, make the filling.*
Weigh out the dough into two 1 lb sections and one 1/2 lb section
You only need 1 lb for this recipe, so you can double the pop tart recipe or freeze the other pound and a half of pastry and use it another time in the next two months
Roll out the dough to 24 inches by 12 inches and about 1/4 inch thick (or as close to that as you can)
Cut the pastry into 4 by 3 inches rectangle (you should be able to get about 24, but I personally only got 14)
Put about a tablespoon of filling in the middle of half of the rectangles (if you have 24 rectangles, put filling on 12 of them). Make sure you leave a boarder of pastry so you can press it together and not have any leakage
Brush water or non dairy milk onto the edges and press another rectangle pastry on top
You can use a fork to press the edges down more if you want, but you don’t have to
Poke holes in the top so the steam has somewhere to go
Repeat until all of the pastries are filled
Place them on a baking sheet, and chill them for another 30 minutes
Heat the oven to 400 degrees F
After 30 minutes, place the pastries on the baking sheet into the oven and bake for about 15-18 minutes or until the edges and tops are golden brown (the tops might be less golden brown than the edges)
Place on a wire cooling wrack and make the icing.**
Once cool, pour the icing on top of the pop tarts and let it set (it will get hard and glossy)
Enjoy! (If you don’t put icing on top, you can freeze them and heat them back up in the toaster)