Wondering what to make with puff pastry? Turns out, there are plenty of options for using puff pastry to make desserts, and they’re all insanely delicious.
Julia Child once said, “When you have mastered puff pastry you will find it such a satisfying and splendid accomplishment that you will bless yourself for every moment you spent learning the techniques.”
These recipe inspirations will get you fired up to make puff pastry so that you can recreate them at home.
What to make with puff pastry: 8 tasty ideas
Danishes
Using a traditional puff pastry, you can configure the dough into delicate twists with a filled center. Whether it’s filled with fruit, chocolate or cream cheese, these delights have the form of a Danish, but the crispy crunch of a puff pastry creation.
Check out three easy ways to fold a Danish and find plenty of filling ideas in Danish Pastries From Scratch.
Cream horns
By wrapping puff pastry dough around cone-shaped molds and then baking, you create beautiful, unicorn horn-shaped pastries. Pipe them full of pastry cream for a beautiful dessert that’s equally creamy and crunchy.
Learn how to make them yourself with our recipe and tutorial.
Palmiers
Also known as orejas or elephant ears, these spiraling sweets are made by spreading a buttery cinnamon-sugar mixture atop puff pastry and then rolling it in two directions to form pastries with twin spirals. They’re sweet, crunchy and crazy addictive.
Get our easy palmiers recipe and tutorial here.
Turnovers
It doesn’t get much simpler than puff pastry turnovers! Simply fill a square of puff pastry with preserves or jam, fold it over into a triangle, bake, drizzle with a little glaze and enjoy the sweet taste of breakfast perfection.
Napoleons
Puff pastry figures prominently into Napoleons, which are made by alternating layers of puff pastry with pastry cream, then topping it off with a glaze, sometimes featuring marbled chocolate. Sliced into clean rectangles or squares, these pastries are as pretty as they are delicious.
Freeform tarts
Sweet or savory, the options are endless when you use puff pastry as the base for a tart. Just roll the pastry into a round or a square, blind bake and then top with a filling. Gesine shows you a savory recipe and the blueberry crostada above in her puff pastry class.
Joconde Imprimé
Looking for a showoff dessert? Look no further than this show-stopping joconde imprimé, which features layers of puff pastry and cream encased in a delicate sponge cake that acts like a jacket, holding the delicious fillings in. Ooh la la!
Get the recipe and step-by-step guidance from baker Gesine Bullock-Prado in Perfect Puff Pastry.
Traditional pie or tart
It doesn’t get much easier than this: Swap puff pastry for the pie or tart shell in your favorite recipe. The texture of puff pastry makes for a supremely flaky crust that’ll make a tried-and-true recipe taste brand new again.
Here’s proof: We reimagined an egg tart using puff pastry as the shell!
Vol au vents
Picture a little basket made of puff pastry that’s filled with savory bites. That’s the basic idea of vol au vents! Once you make the puff pastry base (which is as easy as cutting up a few sheets of it), you can fill the cavity with anything you like. Find out how with our step-by-step tutorial.
Pizza
Yes, you read that right! Since a pizza is, more or less, a tart, you can make a pizza with puff pastry using the same method you’d use to make a tart. The result is a personalized pizza with a crust that’s flakier than you ever dreamed possible.
Editor’s Note: This post was originally publish in June 2016 and was updated in April 2018.
I had asked about Gesine’s classes back in October wondering why they weren’t available. It is now January. When are they going to be available again? I think I’ve been patient, but as a paying subscriber, I’m not getting the full experience that I had paid for. Will our subscriptions be extended to make up for this time?
Where is the piff pastry cinnamon roll recipe?
Some of the links are broken. Why is Gesine’s class not available now?