This year, my birthday fell right in the middle of the COVID-19 quarantine, and I couldn’t have my favorite cake, a delicious chocolate and cookie layered cake called “Marquesa” that Carlos’s mom makes for my birthday every year. I debated for the entire weekend whether I should make myself a yummy birthday cake, but the prospect of finishing a book I was reading kept me glued to the couch.

Then I remembered.

I always keep a package of store-bought vegan puff pastry in my freezer for precisely these kinds of situations. I had 2 or 3 apples on my kitchen counter, and although the book was just too good, I’ve made strudel so many times I thought “I wonder if I could make this without measuring a single one of the ingredients?” I could just toss everything together, pop it in the oven and I’d have a sweet treat for eating after the yummy burger BBQ dinner Carlos was making for me.

VEGAN APPLE STRUDEL

(Quick Fix!)

As with all of our quick fixes, there is no measuring required 

Ingredients

• Your favorite apples for baking, peeled, cored and thinly sliced
• A sheet of store-bought vegan puff pastry (most standard puff pastry is vegan by default but check the ingredients)
• Sugar (I like to use a combination of regular sugar and brown sugar)
• All-purpose flour (a few tablespoons or 1/4 cup as a ballpark amount)
• Cinnamon
• Nutmeg
• Chopped walnuts
• You'll also need parchment paper and tin foil for baking the strudel.

Optional for serving:

• Powdered sugar to dust, and vanilla ice cream to serve a la mode!

Directions

1. Pre-heat the oven to 425 ºF (220ºC) and line a shallow baking sheet with parchment paper.

2. Place the sliced apples in a bowl. Add some flour, some cinnamon, one or two dashes of nutmeg, some regular sugar and/or brown sugar. Add just enough to coat all your apple slices. Give an apple slice a taste and if it tastes sweet and of cinnamon, you're ready to continue with the steps, if not, add a bit more sugar and cinnamon until the taste is to your liking. Fold in some chopped walnuts.

3. Place your sheet of puff pastry on some parchment paper, stretch it slightly by hand to form a rectangle but do not roll it out using a rolling pin as this would diminish the lovely layers of flaky puff pastry.

4. Add your filling in the center, press it tightly together, roll the ends of the dough towards the center and then roll one of the longer sides towards the other so you have a wide log. Press the two ends of the puff pastry tightly together.

5. Carefully transfer the strudel (cut side down) to the prepared baking sheet.

6. Cut some slits in the top of the strudel to let steam escape while baking.

7. Cover loosely with foil and bake in your pre-heated oven for 35 minutes.

8. Remove the foil and bake for 10-15 more minutes or until golden.

9. Let cool only slightly, slice and serve warm with an optional scoop of non- dairy vanilla ice cream. Enjoy!