This came from a combination of this pumpkin cream cheese danish recipe and this apple braid recipe.
Yummm, right?
I've stolen the picture below from the apple braid link above to show how to assemble the braid, it's crazy simple but I'm an all about pictures kind of gal, and stupidly didn't take any because I really wasn't sure how this was going to come out. Do check her's out though, it's made with a bread recipe rather than a pastry and may strike your fancy!
A couple starter tips and reminders.
1.) A reminder for those who know it, and a tip for those who don't... while you're dicing your apples up, sprinkle a little lemon juice on your diced apples while you continue dicing the rest to keep them from browning if you're going to be a while.
2.) For whatever apple pie filling you use, I recommend using one that is light on the liquids so that you don't get a soggy pastry. If your favorite requires some heavy liquids, once you've coated your apples in your spice mixture, when you scoop it out of the bowl to lay in your pastry, drain some of the liquid from it back into the bowl so you get a nice flaky finished product.
3.) When you thaw your pastry sheets, make sure to thaw it at room temperature and not in the fridge (they don't thaw so well in there I learned). If you forget, sandwich you folded pastry dough between 2 pieces of wax paper and stick a warm rice pack on them for a little while. Just make sure to let it cool back down before you remove the wax paper, otherwise the condensation that build up will cause it to stick to the paper making an even bigger mess.
I'm sure this would also be fantastic with a good blueberry pie filling, or maybe some summer peaches? You can also make these into mini's by cutting each sheet into 6 pieces and following the rest of the directions as normal.
What you'll need
4 apples peeled and diced into small bits (I love using red delicious but pick your favorite!)
6Tbps sugar
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground nutmeg
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1 box of frozen pastry sheets (2 per box) thawed (I used Pepperidge Farm)
1 cup confectioners sugar
1 Tbsp milk
1 pizza cutter, some wax paper, a pastry brush (I'm a fan of the silicone ones as they're CRAZY easy to clean in comparison to the ones that look like paint brushes), and a rolling pin (optional).
1.) Take your diced apples and put them into a bowl and coat them with the sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg and vanilla (or spice mixture from your favorite apple pie recipe)
2.) Take 1 of your 2 sheets of pastry dough and put it between 2 pieces of wax paper. Use your rolling pin to close up the creases from where it was folded. If you don't have a rolling pin you can lightly press them together with your fingers.
3.) Lightly grease a baking sheet and preheat your oven to 400º F. Remove one piece of the wax paper from your pastry sheet and flip that puppy over, pastry side down, onto your cookie sheet (so much better than transferring without the paper and getting holes left and right in your dough). Peel your second sheet of wax paper off.
4.)
So, if you're good at Ikea, picture directions and Where's Waldo the above is for you! Mentally divide your dough into 3rds (imagine those creases you just sealed up), and use your pizza cutter to make strips in the outside 3rds. (If you're making mini's out of the 6ths you can probably only get about 3 slices in) I used a small cutting board to lay across my dough to make sure my lines were even (because I have a perfectionist issue like that) but I'm sure it works just fine if you don't. Sprinkle your filling down the center and cross your dough strips over. Mine weren't long enough to touch the other side as her's are in the picture...probably because I like my apple filling and might have gone a little overboard with it. As long as your dough has another piece of dough somewhere to stick to in order to keep it from shrinking back up during baking, you're good to go.
5.) The dough box says to cook for 15 minutes, but that's assuming you're cooking it without filling. I found that 25-30 was the perfect number, on an airbake cookie sheet, though I set my timer for 15 and checked it every 5 minutes there after while it continued to cook. I didn't let it get golden brown on the top, but rather let it get flaky and crispy...that meant it was golden brown on bottom, rather than burnt!
6.) Once it's done, remove it from the oven and slide it off your cookie sheet onto a cutting board or serving dish. (reason number 2 I used my airbake...it slides off the sides easy enough as there's no lip). If your cookie sheet has a lip all the way around, a spatula or pastry scraper to get under it and guide it over the lip gently will work just fine. You'll want to move it soon though rather than let it cool on the cookie sheet so that the heat from your cookie sheet doesn't continue cooking your dough.
As soon as you've transferred it combine 1 cup confectioners sugar to 1 Tbsp of milk (I had to add an extra pinch of milk in order to make the consistency right) and brush it on top of your braid. Make sure you brush with your braid and not against the dough to help it keep from flaking and pulling apart as it's still cooling. That means you'll have to do each side separately. If you're having troubles you can put your glaze in the microwave for 10 second intervals until it becomes a little easier to spread (it usually doesn't take much more than 15 seconds tops). Don't add more milk though or it will just make your dough soggy and won't "harden" the way it should because there's too much liquid.
Let it cool and you're ready to serve either cold, room temperature, or warm...maybe a la mode?
Enjoy! Hope yours comes out just as scrumptious (I've bitten into braid number 2 as I write this and am not quite sure there will be any for hubby when he gets home!)
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