Puff Pastry Star with Cinnamon Sugar

Buttery, sweet, and lightly spiced, puff pastry with cinnamon sugar is a match made in heaven. You can call it a star or a snowflake, but either way it’s delicious! Make it with store bought puff pastry, or make your own easy rough puff.

What is Puff Pastry?

Puff pastry is a laminated, flaky pastry make with butter, flour, salt, and water. A large sheet of butter is folded into a dough, and through several rolls and folds creates thin layers of butter throughout the pastry. As it bakes, the moisture from the butter evaporates, creating steam and giving the pastry it’s puff.

While full puff pastry requires several hours of time with folding and rolling the dough, you can also make easy puff pastry. Also called rough puff or cheater puff, this recipe gives you two flaky, delicious sheets of pastry in fraction of the time.

For this puff pastry star with cinnamon sugar, you can make your own easy puff pastry (click here for the recipe-it makes two sheets) or you can buy premade puff pastry at your local market.

Where Can I find Puff Pastry in the Store?

Puff Pastry is in the freezer section of your grocery store. It should be near the frozen pie crusts and the phyllo dough. If you have a smaller local grocery store, they may not stock it.

The most common puff pastry stocked in grocery stores is Pepperidge Farms. While it does puff nicely, it has fats besides butter in it which changes the flavor. DuFour Puff Pastry is all butter, and Trader Joe’s also sells all-butter puff pastry sheets.

Ingredients for the Puff Pastry Star with Cinnamon Sugar

Puff Pastry with Cinnamon Sugar Ingredients

• 2 sheets of puff pastry-see the section above about homemade vs. store bought puff pastry
• 1/4 cup sugar– white, granulate sugar works best here
• 1 1/2 Tablespoons ground cinnamon-you can add more or less, depending on how “spicy” you’d like your pastry to be
• 1 Tablespoon of soft butter-as if there wasn’t enough butter in the puff pastry, right? But a little smear of butter on the pastry helps the cinnamon sugar to stick better when baking.

Frosting Ingredients

• 1 Tbsp. butter – melted
• 3/4 cup powdered sugar – sift to remove any lumps
• 1-2 Tablespoons milk – add this until the frosting is a good drizzling or dipping consistency. You don’t want it runny, but it also shouldn’t be too thick
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract – it’s just not the same without that li’l hint of vanilla, you know?

Assembling and Baking the Puff Pastry Star with Cinnamon Sugar

Preparing the Pastry Sheets

Begin by rolling your puff pastry sheets to slightly larger than a 12″ square. Place a 12″ plate on the pastry and use a wheeled cutter to cut around it. I used a pizza cutter, so it doesn’t need to be anything fancy!

If you wish to use a smaller plate, you absolutely can. Just roll the pastry to the appropriate size.

Spread a thin layer of butter over both pieces of puff pastry. It doesn’t need to be much, but a little bit helps the cinnamon sugar stick.

Layering the Puff Pastry and Cinnamon Sugar

Mix together 1/4 cup of sugar and 1 1/2-3 tablespoons of ground cinnamon. You can add more or less, depending on how spiced you like it. I personally prefer it on the spicy side, but if you want it milder reduce the cinnamon to one tablespoon.

Sprinkle a generous amount over the buttered side of one pastry circle. Place the other round of pastry dough over the other, with the buttered side down. Line them up as closely as you can.

A Note on Cinnamon Sugar

You can make your cinnamon sugar spicier or sweeter by changing the amount of cinnamon added.

Shaping the Pastry

Place a small bowl over the center of the layered pastry dough, and use a sharp knife to cut it into quarters. Then, cut each of those quarters into 4 sections. You should end up with sixteen sections.

Beat an egg well and brush it over the top of the cut pastry. This helps create the golden brown finish and also acts as a glue to hold the twists in place as they bake.

Working in pairs, twist each section of the dough three times in opposite directions. Fold the ends over and press down firmly to seal them. If your puff pastry is warm, pop it in the refrigerator for about 20 minutes before baking. This helps solidify the butter again and gives you a better puff.

Baking the Puff Pastry Star

Bake the pastry at 425° for 20-25 minutes, or until it’s a deep golden brown.

Remove the pastry from the oven and allow it to cool before frosting and serving.

Making the Frosting and Serving the Puff Pastry Cinnamon Sugar Star

To make the frosting, melt the butter and allow it to cool. Mix in the sifted powdered sugar, then add a teaspoon of vanilla. Stir in the whole milk, a tablespoon at a time, until it’s thin enough to drizzle, but thick enough that it won’t soak into the pastry.

To decorate the top of the puff pastry star, get some frosting on a spoon. As it slowly drips off, move it across the pastry, causing it to fall in lines. Just play with it and continue until you’re happy with the way it looks!

Serve the puff pastry star with extra frosting for dipping. Each section can simply be pulled off by hand for eating.

Recipe Notes and Tips

• If you feel your pastry getting soft or warm, simply pop it back in the refrigerator for about 10 minutes. Pastry that gets warm won’t puff as well in the oven.
• Puff pastry is always best served the day it’s baked. However, this is still delicious if made the day before. Just frost it right before serving so that the frosting doesn’t dry out and harden too much.

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