As soon I stumbled upon the step by step photos on making pop tarts on Chez Pim, I knew I’d have to give it a thumbs up. With my 5 y.o. cousin who’s always happy to bake with me, these strawberry pop tarts would be perfect, given that he’s not a fan of chocolate (Yes, I know!).
I’m not so fond of jam, so what I did was use a little strawberry jam as a base and added a whole lot of chopped fresh strawberries to accentuate the taste of the jam as well as give the filling some texture. And just because I was feeling a little frivilous, I added half a vanilla bean to it. It already felt so perfect that I instantly started thinking of the different flavour combinations I’d be trying in the future – plum and star anise, apple and cinnamon, strawberry and lime, Nutella and chopped hazelnuts! What would be your favourite flavour for these pop tarts?
For the flaky pastry crust I used this recipe and increased the sugar by two tablespoons. Making the dough was easier than ever with my KitchenAid! All I had to do was put the dry ingredients in the bowl and pop in the rest of the ingredients in the prescribed order, and it was ready! I’m still in awe of it. I just stand there and gape at it in amazement while all the mixing is being done (so I don’t think I will be multitasking for a while!).
Strawberry Filling Recipe
Strawberry jam
Fresh strawberries, chopped
½ a vanilla bean, split and scraped
No proportions here because that just depends on how chunky or smooth you’d like your filling to be. I used approx 5 tablespoons of jam with a large handful of strawberries. And once you’ve scraped the bean, toss the remains into your jar of sugar to have some Vanilla sugar instead of spending a fortune over it!
While we took turns to roll out the dough and spread the strawberry filling, we made a whole lot of different shapes and different cuts for the steam to escape. He had seen all the step by step photos with me and knew exactly what to do, so before I could tell him what had to be done, he’d go run and get whatever was required! Even yesterday, when we made lavender cupcakes, he told me to be careful and not fill the batter till the top and also wait for the cake to cool down, failing which the icing will melt! Very pleasantly surprised by this since he doesn’t bake at home! I finally have a smart and enthusiastic baking partner and I really wish he didn’t have to go back to England!
