If your pores are sweating gravy from all the Thanksgiving leftovers, I’ve got you covered with this 30-minute, easy-to-make apple strudel—a little sweetness to balance out all of that savory.
I know, I’m pushing it with this, but food logged or not—let’s start talking Christmas. I can’t believe that in a little more than three weeks, I’m going to be back to filling my 9-inch plate from edge-to-edge with turkey and 5-7 sides.
I love holiday food, can you tell?
Well this year, Naomi and I decided to host Christmas day dinner at our home for my family and this strudel is going to make an appearance alongside Naomi’s dessert.
I have no idea what she has planned for dessert, or if it fits the scheme, the menu or whatever it is people do to coordinate flavors. But this apple strudel is my easy way out for the baking portion—30 minutes and done—yay me!
Of course I still have to figure out the savory stuff, but that, as I’ve learned, needs to be coordinated—no mish-mosh of things thrown together like some cheap buffet. So, yeah, you may just see some of those Christmas dishes here in the coming weeks.
Until then, enjoy the strudel! And if you are tired of apples, try swapping out the apples and cinnamon for pears and cardamom, or persimmons with cinnamon and Grand Marnier.
Easy 30-Minute Apple Strudel
Ingredients
- 1 puff pastry sheet, thawed according to instructions
- 4 cups honeycrisp apples (about 5 medium apples), peeled, cored and sliced
- 1/2 cup sugar
- 2 teaspoons cinnamon
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon flour
- Topping
- egg wash
- 4 tablespoons cinnamon sugar (4 tablespoons sugar and 1 teaspoon cinnamon combined)
Instructions
- Preparation: Heat oven to 400 degrees.
- Remove one sheet of puff pastry from freezer and thaw according to instructions. In the meantime, add apples, sugar, cinnamon and vanilla extract in a bowl and toss to combine; set aside for minutes 15 minutes to sweat. Add in flour and toss to combine.
- Roll out puff pastry to a 12x16 rectangle on top of a sheet of parchment paper, Lightly score puff pastry into three vertical columns, with the middle column being 7 inches wide and the two outer columns at 21/2 inches. Cut slits on either side of the center column to 1 inch wide and 2 1/2 inches long.
- Place apple mixture in the center and fold top of puff pastry down. Begin to pull alternating slits from one side to the other, making sure ends reach the edge of filling. Brush egg wash on top and sprinkle with cinnamon sugar. For extra crunch, finish with a sprinkling of coarse sugar.
- Transfer strudel on top of parchment paper to the oven and bake for about 10-12 minutes or until golden brown. Remove from oven and cool on a wire rack for 5 minutes before slicing into it.
You’re the boss of fast and easy yet totally amazing recipes! You totally owned it with this one. Pinned!
Thanks Tori! I took a little break and glad to be back. Have a great week!
THESE PHOTOS! I adore all the process shots!
my Grandma makes a mean apple strudel..but you made yours in 30 mins, which wins. Bring on all the Christmas recipes Matt! Pinned!
Thanks Taylor! Those were done with the boys begging me to play with them. Hope you had a great Thanksgiving!
Look at you man, you look like a true Maitre Patissier!
Ha! So far from that but I have fun in there for sure. Hope you had an awesome Thanksgiving Mike.
This recipe (and photos!) are killing!
Thanks so much Tieghan!
Woah! I know who I’m inviting over to make breakfast and dessert for us during the holidays! Nice work, my friend! #WolfpackEats
We should all meet up in the middle of somewhere one of these days for sure. Thanks David!
Can’t wait to try this! And have for breakfast because it’s all I want now 🙂 Yum
It’s incredibly easy, Kim, you have to! Thanks:)
That my friend is a stunner!!!
Thanks so much Jocelyn!
A gorgeous strudel, Matt! Love all that sugar on top, too! And of course, love the step-by-step photos!
This was so fun to make, thanks so much Lisa!
I am all over this and with Honey Crisp oh yeah! Love that “sweating gravy…” line. Classic! #WolfpackEats
That’s exactly how I felt, thanks Kevin!
I love how easy this recipe is! Puff Pastry is always a good choice, and I’m loving the Honeycrisp apples. 🙂 Thanksgiving is over, so of course we all need to move on to Holiday recipes!
Thanks Meggan, hope you had a great Thanksgiving!
The coarse sugar on top and braiding looks amazing! I love 30 minute desserts that have everyone else thinking it took way longer! 🙂
That’s all the time I’ve got:) Thanks Natasha!
Tired of apples? Never! I love them year-round. Wonderful strudel!
Thanks Brenda, hope you and your family had an awesome Thanksgiving!
OOoooo what a great idea!! And apples are forever welcome on my plate!!
Thanks so much Zainab!
This is one beautiful strudel! The braided top makes it look so fancy pants–I’m sure it will be devoured in nanoseconds 🙂
And it’s really not so fancy, super easy to make. Thanks Amy!
Ok, this looks SO good I can almost taste it! In fact, my husband saw your sneak peak photo yesterday on insta and immediately asked me to make it! Awesome job!
Love hearing that, thanks so much Aubrie! Let me know how it turns out:)
Pretty food that tastes good! My kind of dessert.
And very simple to make too:) Thanks Rina!
This is such a perfect dessert! I love how easy it is to make. Anything and everything apple is winning in my book!
It really is an easy one, Danae. Thank you!
Love this recipe & all the process shots you included. I’d be all for the apple cinnamon mixture, but persimmon and grand marnier? That sounds AMAZING as well. 🙂
Glad to be back and had fun making this one for sure. Thanks Alexandra!
Love this – I should have made this for my family’s Thanksgiving bake-off. Instead I made a coconut cream pie that failed miserably. 🙁 I guess I can look forward to the Christmas competition. 🙂
We all fail miserably with some recipes, right? Impossible not to! Thanks so much and I do hope you try this one!
I love that sugared topping, 30 minutes is just perfect for an easy and delicious apple dessert!
30 minutes is all I’ve got most of the time:) Thanks Laura, and I hope you had a great Thanksgiving!
Fantastic idea Matt – I love this quick and incredibly easy dessert – but wait – this can even double as breakfast!
It can totally double as breakfast, Shashi! Thanks!
Well. We hosted both of our family’s for Thanksgiving and I needed a xanax by 10 a.m.! 30 minute desserts are the best especially good (or maybe that’s ‘bad’) for cravings! This is a great recipe, Matt!
Hilarious Paula! Thanks so much.
I can’t believe how easy to make this look! It’s perfect for the busy holiday season 🙂
It really is, you should try it. Really fun to make. Thanks Nora!
Beautiful and beautifully delicious no doubt!
Thanks so much Teresa!
Desserts are always the last thing I think about at dinner parties… so a recipe that’s quick, simple and seasonal is a good thing to have available.
I am the same way, Brian. I rarely have room for them anyway, but this one is so easy and light. Thanks!
I am NOT sick of apple desserts yet — and this looks totally amazing! Good luck with your Christmas dinner! I’m sure you guys will be cooking up an incredible feast!
Thanks Ashley! Yeah, that will be fun, we will feed our family for a change instead of our neighbors:)
I’m up for strudel ALL year long, no matter when it is. This is fabulous!
Same here Dorothy, thanks so much. Hope you guys had a great Thanksgiving!
You’re always making the dish looks so delicious buy not difficult to cook at all! I have tons of apple at home and this recipe is perfect to get rid of them!
Yes, you have to try this then, Maggie!
Loving the action shots, mate! Forwarded your epic waffle creations to my mates and so many are a huge fan…who knew stuffing could be…waffled.
Wow, that’s awesome to hear, thanks so much Arman!
Yay for quick and decadent dessert recipe! Please keep the Christmas recipes coming. I got a few in the works as well.
Can’t wait to see them Matt, thanks!
My grandma has an apple streudel that is a tradition in our house – I’ve never made it myself but I will have to try this one – ESP because it’s ONLY 30 minutes!! WIN!
You should Megan, so good, especially this time of year!
This is the prettiest Apple Strudel I’ve ever seen! and ok, I need that apple core remover thing. Where did you get that?! and I’m totally already thinking and planning for Christmas dinner. . I’m just glad we’re going to my parents’ house so they are in charge of the main dishes and I will help with sides and dessert 🙂
Wow, thank you Alice! We got it at Sur La Table, but a long time ago. The brand is Messermeister. It’s actually fun using it. Stress reliever for sure:)
Gorgeous + Simple is always a win in my book!! This looks amazing!
Thanks so much Glory!
This is so pretty, and it looks easy enough to make. Can’t wait to try this one 🙂
You have to Shareba, super easy and so worth it. Thanks!
How could I NOT pin this recipe when we are store bought puff pastry soul-mates??! So Naomi didn’t offer to make you a fresh batch of homemade puff pastry?? Shocking!
Hilarious, Nagi! Seriously though, right? 🙂 Thanks so much!
This looks beautiful! I hosted Thanksgiving, so I’m looking forward to letting someone else do all the work at Christmas. Though this strudel just may need to make an appearance!
Thanks so much Stephanie!
This recipie simply and sadly does not work. The puff pastry rolled out to to 12×16 is too thin to hold the contents. Which brings me to the point that 5 apples is too much volume for such weak pastry dough.
Between the water sweated by the apples and the super thin puff pastry, the bottom of the pastry does not bake in the 10-12 minutes called for, but instead turns into a soggy mess that does not hold the apples at all. I’ve had to resort to turing over the entire strudel and cooking it in the oven upside down to bake the bottom. I’ve even tried baking directly ON the oven racks with only a sugary mess in the bottom of my overn.
I’ve tried this recipe now three times and am looking to the comments to tell me where my error is. But instead, I find the comments being about how “excited” people are to make it or how “pretty” it looks. It is indeed very beautiful. Alas, no one has made it! My advice is to not bother. And it doesn’t happen in 30 minutes either. After peeling, coring, slicing (mandolin) sweating, assembly and baking, you’re looking at more like 1.5 hours. Trust me. I had such high hopes for this very nice recipe.
Can this be made the night before and stored on counter or fridge?
Do you put the parchment filled struedel on a baking sheet??
This is just beautiful. Going to make this for my grandsons school. Thank you for sharing.
I just made this last night! It was delicious and surprisingly simple (especially because I have a 3-in- 1 apple peeler/corer/slicer). HOWEVER, the bake time for me was significantly too short. I folloved the recipe to a “t” , but even 20 min into baking the dough was still raw. I kept checking it every 4 min or so, but it took about 25-30min to cook. It wasn’t at all dry or over cooked after 25 min, but was finally no longer raw. Did I miss some “pre-bake the puff pastry step” or something? It’s strange how different our cook times were.
Either way, it was so delicious and easy and impressive-looking, so I’ll be saving this recipe for the future! Thank you!
Made this today but took 30 min not 10-12 …did I misread somrthing🤔? Fresh apples take longer than that to cook through.
Heres my photo. Looks good