An apple strudel is one of my winter favorites. It’s easy to make and the apples bring back those golden autumn memories.
Canned apples
We have an apple orchard at our country house and one of the ways we like to preserve the harvest is by canning grated apples. Having a jar of those at the ready makes this a super fast recipe to throw together. But even if you don’t have those on hand it’s not particularly difficult (although it is a bit more time consuming) to prepare fresh apples for this.
Strudel dough
There are lots of variations of an apple strudel – starting from the kind of dough to the additional ingredients for the filling you can use. As for the dough I am using a prepackaged puff pastry dough I get at the grocery store. That is not the same type of dough that is traditionally used for an apple strudel but it is the most convenient option. If you are up for it you can absolutely make your own dough. I haven’t worked up the courage to try that one just yet 🙂
Strudel filling
For the filling you can also add raisins or nuts, both of those are very common. If you are adding the raisins I would suggest soaking them in some water (or even rum if you want t spice things up a bit) for an hour or so. That way they will get nice and soft. As for the nuts the most popular variety is walnuts but pecans will work nicely with the apples as well. There are of course all sorts of things you can fill a strudel with if you want to change out the apples for something else completely.
Tips and tricks
If you are planning to work with prepackaged dough like I do I would recommend taking it out of the fridge only about 10 or so mins before using it. You want the dough to soften up at room temperature so that you can unroll it and then roll it up again. But you don’t want it to be too soft and warm because then it will get sticky and can tear up.
To make the job of rolling up the heavy dough with all the filling on it easier you can start by laying the dough on a tea towel before adding the apples. That way you can pull the tea towel up and it will lift everything at once.
Take the time to grate the apples instead of chopping them into pieces. The sharp edges of the apple pieces would slice through the dough and it would tear up all over. This can work if you are using a different, thicker kind of dough rather than the thin puff pastry dough.
Ingredients
- 300 g puff pastry dough
- 4 apples
- 100 g brown sugar
- 1 tbsp cinnamon
- 1 egg
Instructions
- Peel and grate the apples.
- Mix in the brown sugar and cinnamon.
- Spread the apple filling on the dough in a thin layer. Leave about 2 cm on all the edges.
- Roll up the dough. First flip the clean edges on the shorter sides onto the apple filling. Then start rolling up along the long edge. Once you get almost all the way to the other end flip the long clean edge onto your rolled dough and stick it on.
- Line a baking tray with baking paper. Carefully lay the strudel onto the tray with the connected long edge facing down.
- Whisk the egg and do a light egg wash all over the strudel.
- Bake in the oven at 210 °C for about 25 mins (or follow the baking instructions on the package of your puff pastry dough).