Looking for a fruity dessert, breakfast, or brunch recipe? Easy Apple Cream Cheese Strudel is right up your alley!
Pastry isn’t as challenging as you might think. My Easy Apple Cream Cheese Strudel uses only 6 ingredients and 10 minutes of your time for a fancy-pants breakfast or dessert!
Puff pastry is one of those things that is fairly simple to make at home, but it can be a bit time-consuming. To make it you have to fold butter inside of dough and fold.
Make sure to PIN this Easy Apple Strudel!
This process is repeated a few times with chilling time in between each rolling out. If you have ever seen The Great British Baking Show, you know what I am talking about.
And while I love a good homemade dough, I LOVE a shortcut. So much so that I buy my puff pastry at the store. It is just as delicious and saves me oodles of time. I am sure many of you can relate.
The trick here is to use premade puff pastry. I prefer to use an all-butter puff pastry as opposed to vegetable oil pastry. Some folks can tell the difference, some can’t, just check the box if you are at all concerned.
My dirty little secret is that I keep a few sheets in the freezer at all times knowing that I can always pull out a sheet and put together an impressive dish, any time of day, like:
Easy Apple Cream Cheese Strudel was hot, hot, hot in my house that it was G-O-N-E in minutes.
Apple pie filling is already perked up with a blend of spices, but feel free to liven even further with cinnamon and/or nutmeg. Give it a taste and let your tastebuds decide if anything else is needed.
The cream cheese in this dish adds a bit of sophistication to buttery layers of puff pastry and a luxurious bite. Rich, but not overdoing it.
It might seem like a lot, but brushing the top with butter does two things. One, it will give it a gorgeous sheen and a toasty brown color when it comes out and two, it will serve as a “glue” for your toppings.
I like to top mine with turbinado sugar and sliced almonds. Turbinado sugar is golden brown and larger in terms of crystal size than that of the white sugar we are so familiar with.
It is partially refined which means it has a bit of molasses left in it. Translation: rich sweetness and added crunch. The almonds are just a nutty bonus!
The cuts and the folding of this gem can be a little tricky when you do it for the first time. Use the image below as a guide. You will have it in no time at all!
Next, fold, slather, fill and bake! Easy Apple Cream Cheese Strudel is literally that easy!
If you like this easy pastry recipe, check these sweet breakfast recipes out:
Easy Apple Cream Cheese Strudel Recipe
Ingredients
- 1 sheet puff pastry defrosted
- 2 ounces cream cheese room temperature
- 2 tablespoons light brown sugar
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
- 1 cup apple pie filling
- 2 tablespoons butter melted
- 1 tablespoons almonds thinly sliced
- 1 tablespoon turbinado sugar
Instructions
- Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and preheat oven to 400 degrees.
- In a small bowl, blend together softened cream cheese with light brown sugar and vanilla. Set aside.
- Unroll puff pastry on a clean work space. Make 4-5 diagonal cuts down each side at the same intervals. See photo.
- Brush with melted butter. Spread cream cheese down the center, topped with apple pie filling.
- Fold over the bottom piece, then alternating sides, braid strips of puff pastry over filling. At the end, fold over the end piece before the last two diagonal cuts.
- Brush top with melted butter and transfer to baking sheet. Top with sliced almonds and turbinado sugar.
- Bake for 12-15 minutes, or until puff pastry is fluffy and lightly browned. Remove and serve hot or at room temperature.
- If you’ve tried this recipe, come back and let us know how it was!
I can not print this recipe to use it. It acts like it goes to print and then flips back the original page viewed. Frustrating!
Hi Cyndi, we just had our tech team take a look and there are no issues on our end. Do you have a pop-up blocker on your computer? That might be the issue.
Can I make earlier in day and reheat?
Sure!
ONE MORE QUESTION…IF YOU CAN’T FIND PUFF PASTRY…COULD YOU USE PIE CRUST?
You could, but might impact the cooking time, just watch it closely. 🙂
CAN YOU PREPARE THIS THE NIGHT BEFORE (ASSEMBLE) , PUT IN FRIDGE AND THEN BAKE THE NEXT MORNING?
Hi Tracey, I haven’t tried it, but I don’t see why not! I’d wrap it tight in plastic wrap so the filling doesn’t escape out the sides.
We love puff pastry so thought I’d give it a try and so glad I did. I didn’t have apple pie filling so I used cherry and I used 4 Oz of cream cheese. Made two of them and they came out beautiful and delicious. My husband had friends over and some of them thought he got them at a bakery.
I’m making more for Christmas Day. Thanks for recipe. LINDA P.
Yay! So glad to hear that and thanks for coming back to let us know. Merry Christmas, Linda
So easy and everyone loved it. Will be making again. Probably make 2- they go fast.
Turned out good ! Tasted good too 😋 didn’t care for the almonds on top but they gave it a nice crunch 🍽️
Thanks for the feedback, Shanice!
Hi , the video shows brown sugar and vanilla being added to the cream cheese, but they aren’t listed in the printed recipe. What are the measurements for those?
Hi! You are totally correct, we migrated recipes from one format to another and it seems step #2 is missing. Fixing it right now 🙂
OK, are those sliced peaches on there also? I don’t see them in the recipe. Thanks.
Hi Linde, nope, no peaches. Only canned apple pie! But you could use peaches if you wanted!