Oh heeeeeeeey! Remember me? How on Earth are you all?
Well, this year has been a bit mental hasn’t it? My last post was at the start of the first lockdown and never in a million years did I think we’d now be right in the middle of Lockdown 2.0. But hey, all we can do is get through it and I’ve decided to get through it by fully immersing myself into all things Christmas. And yes, I KNOW IT’S NOVEMBER, but sometimes you’ve just gotta do what you gotta do. And I gotta do Christmas!!
So I am here to help you get through this weird, wonderful and very different Christmas we’re going to have this year. And what better way to start than with one of my favourite recipes. This Nutella Puff Pastry Christmas Tree is insanely quick, insanely easy but, most importantly - insanely delicious. I don’t think I’ve ever made one that has lasted longer than 15mins, and there are so many different variations you can try.
So what are we waiting for?! Let’s do this.
You will need
- 2 sheets of pre-made puff pastry
- A jar of your preferred chocolate spread
- An egg
- Icing sugar
- (And any additional flavours you want: caramel, peanut butter, Lotus Biscoff, chocolate orange..go frigging wild!)
- A sharp knife
- A large baking tray
- Baking parchment (if your puff pastry doesn’t come with it already)
And that’s it!!
Method
Preheat your oven at 200ºC, (I feel like my go-to phrase is, “just whack it on 200, it’ll be fine”).
I should probably start by saying that if you’re skilled enough and fancy making the pastry from scratch, by all means do!! Honestly, I’m just too lazy and would rather watch an extra episode of ‘The Crown’ than get hands-deep in flour and butter.
Take the puff pastry out of the fridge 10/15 mins before you want to use it. This is actually really important, so many times I’ve been like, “naaaaah it’ll be fine” and then when I’ve tried to unroll it, it’s cracked and stuck together and so many horrible things. So learn from me and make sure you prep.
Carefully unroll the pastry. At this point if your pastry doesn’t have baking paper underneath it you’ll want to pop it on some.
Then lay one pastry sheet on top of the other, making sure there is a piece of baking paper in-between them.
When scoring the Christmas tree shape, you’ll want to press gentle enough that it won’t cut the pastry, but hard enough that it will outline the shape on both pastry sheets.
Start at the bottom first and using the knife, outline the tree’s trunk and then move to the top and outline the Christmas tree (triangle) shape, so it looks a little something like this…
Don’t worry about the top going to an exact point, you’ll be popping a star at the top so no-one will know!
If it doesn’t look neat or is a bit wonky, don’t panic!! It’ll be absolutely fine, you’re going to be cutting and twisting things and you won’t be able to tell if it’s a little skew-whiff…promise!
Okay, so now take the top sheet of pastry off and place it to one side. Cut along the Christmas tree outlines and remove the excess pastry but DON’T THROW IT AWAY!!! Keep it intact on a separate plate because you’ll be needing it later.
Now for the best bit. Open that beautiful jar of dreams and cover one sheet of pastry in it. Now how much spread should you use, I hear you ask? That is completely up to you. I’m not going to tell you how much to use, you use as much as you bloody want!! I normally put a nice thick layer over the entirety of it, but my veins run with chocolate instead of blood so put as much or little spread as you’d like.
**If you are adding any additional flavours, do so now**
Now, peel the other sheet of pastry off the baking paper, (being careful not to stretch the pastry) and lay the sheet on top of the chocolate covered pastry.
Using the trunk as a guide, cut horizontal lines up both sides of the tree leaving 2cm gap between each one, making sure to leave the centre intact.
Until your tree looks a little something like this…
Things are going to get ever so slightly messy at this point. Take one of the “branches”, (I honestly don’t know what else to call them) and twist it away from you. You’ll probably get 2-3 twists in the branches at the bottom and one twist towards the top when the branches get smaller.
Twist away until it looks a little something like this….
Using the left over pastry cut out a star shape (or if you’re artistically challenged like me, you can cut out two triangles and place one on top of the other….yes I really do this) and pop it at the top of your tree.
You can use the leftover pastry to create a number of additional treats. I sometimes like to make mini croissants, parcels or twists. This time I thought I would stick with the Christmas theme and made mini pastry stars.
**And it was at this point that I realised I had a star shaped cookie cutter somewhere in the back of the cupboard that I could have been using this entire time…tit.**
Lightly beat the egg and give the entire tree and any other additional pastry shapes an egg wash.
Place the tree on a baking tray, keeping the baking paper underneath and bake in the preheated oven for 15-20 mins until it has puffed up and is golden brown.
**I should also point out that until this post I didn’t have a baking tray big enough so I just used to lay it over two smaller baking trays, which also worked fine!**
Take the tree out the oven, leave it to slightly cool for a couple of mins and dust with icing sugar.
And there you have it! You can also decorate the tree with berries or sprinkles, the world’s your oyster.
Variations
90% of the time when I make this tree I usually make a vegan one. My bf can’t have dairy or eggs, so I normally use a vegan chocolate and hazelnut spread and hazelnut milk instead of the egg wash. It tastes just as delicious and the pastry still browns and crisps up! Most people are really surprised when I’ve said it’s a vegan dessert. Go plant power!!
I also like to experiment with the fillings. I’ll sometimes add blobs of peanut butter on top of the chocolate spread, or drizzle over some caramel. I’ve put in chocolate orange segments or white chocolate buttons. Honestly it’s so easy to change things up and it always tastes delicious.
And there we have it - the Nutella Puff Pastry Christmas Tree!! Thank you so much for reading and I really hope you’ve enjoyed it. If you do happen to give it a go make sure you send it my way, I love love love seeing your creations.
And as always please like, share, subscribe, blah blah blah, the usual spiel… lets share this delicious Christmas joy!
And I can’t believe I’m still saying this but stay safe, check in with people, wear your frigging mask and look after one another.
Whether you’re running marathons or watching them, (I know which one I am) you’re doing great and we’re just going to have to get through this madness together, I suggest with copious amounts of baked goods!
Love to you all.
Happy Baking!
L x
