Cheaters Lemon and Berry Strudel

We had a fancy afternoon tea on the weekend. I whipped up this amazing lemon and berry strudel, using my awesome culinary skills, in no time flat.

Ok fine, I confess, unless you call defrosting a sheet of puff pastry and turning on the oven skill, I didn’t use any culinary skills at all to make this cheaters lemon and berry strudel.

But I wasn’t lying about how awesome it was, nor how fast it is to make.

This is a seriously good, seriously easy, totally cheaters, way to make a fancy looking afternoon tea or dessert.

You only need three main ingredients – puff pastry, lemon butter (lemon curd) and frozen berries.

I cheated even more because I didn’t even make the lemon butter myself, my eight year old made at school as part of his kitchen garden program! But this is the recipe I use if we ever have enough lemons to make it ourselves

The biggest skill involved in making this is trying to cut the pastry flaps mostly even on both sides!

Even the basic icing (frosting) we drizzled over the top was easy – just icing sugar (powdered sugar) and lemon juice.

Cheaters Lemon Berry Strudel

Yield: 4-6 slices

Prep Time: 5 minutes

Cook Time: 30 minutes

Total Time: 35 minutes

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Ingredients

• 1 sheet of frozen puff pastry - thawed
• 2 tbsp lemon butter
• 1 1/2 cup mixed berries (frozen or fresh)
• 1/2 cup icing sugar
• a squeeze or 2 of lemon juice

Instructions

1. Preheat the oven to 200 Celsius.
2. Line a tray with baking paper and put a sheet of pastry onto the baking paper.
3. Divide the pasttry roughly into thirds length ways - cut strips on each of the outer thirds, leaving the centre third for the filling.
4. Spread the lemon butter onto the middle of the pastry sheet and top with berries.
5. Fold the flaps of pastry from each side into the middle, pressing the ends closed.
6. Bake in a hot oven for 20-30 minutes or until the pastry is golden brown.
7. Mix lemon juice and icing sugar (powdered sugar) together in a small bowl and when the strudel has cooled drizzle the icing over the top.

The hardest part of the whole process was waiting for it to cool down enough to drizzle on the icing!

This recipe makes enough four big pieces or six smallish ones, but I suggest you make two because everyone will want seconds.

 
If you are looking for some more easy family dessert ideas check out these recipes.