Nut croissants (nussgipfel)

Wherever you go in Switzerland you’ll see these croissants. They’re almost like a baklava, but instead of filo pastry, we use a basic frozen puff pastry. Quite often in Switzerland you would use a dollop of quark (somewhere between a ricotta and a cream cheese), but here I just use cream in the mixture. You want it to have a porridge-like consistency.

• makes

  32

• prep

  30 minutes

• cook

  15 minutes

• difficulty

  Easy

Ingredients

• 4 sheets frozen puff pastry
• 250 g (1¼ cups) almond meal
• 110 g (½ cup) caster sugar
• 4 sponge finger biscuits
• 1 tsp ground cinnamon
• 80 ml (⅓ cup) double cream
• 1 apple, grated
• zest of 1 orange
• juice of ½ lemon
• 200 g (1¼ cups) pure icing sugar 

Cooling time 10 minutes

Instructions

Preheat oven to 220ºC. Defrost puff pastry. Cut pastry sheets in half and cut each half into 4 triangles, to create 32 triangles in total.

Mix almond meal, caster sugar, sponge finger biscuits ground to almond meal consistency, cinnamon, cream, apple and orange zest.

Spread 1 tablespoon of mixture over each triangle and roll up towards the point to form a crescent shape. Place on 2 oven trays lined with baking paper and bake for 15 minutes.

Meanwhile, to make icing, slowly add lemon juice to icing sugar and stir to combine. Remove croissants from oven and set aside to cool for 10 minutes, then brush icing over tops.

Photography by Sean Fennessey.

As seen in Feast magazine, June 2014, Issue 32. 

Cook's Notes

Oven temperatures are for conventional; if using fan-forced (convection), reduce the temperature by 20˚C. | We use Australian tablespoons and cups: 1 teaspoon equals 5 ml; 1 tablespoon equals 20 ml; 1 cup equals 250 ml. | All herbs are fresh (unless specified) and cups are lightly packed. | All vegetables are medium size and peeled, unless specified. | All eggs are 55-60 g, unless specified.