Walnut Cardamom Pastries
Walnut Cardamom Pastries. To brighten up tea time!
I like my pastries. I’m the granddaughter of bakers. I grew up at a bakery with a beautiful case full of delicious pastries, cakes, assorted breads.
My grandmother was always covered in flour. She lived to bake.
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Literally.
She had a bakery with her siblings and my grandpa for almost 50 years. Right down the street from where I grew up. And every day, she woke up before the sun to bake bread every single day for half of a century! Now that’s commitment!
The bakery is still there. It was sold to other people, the family no longer runs it.
I have very sweet memories of the bread being made, the giant bread machine that would knead pounds and pounds of French bread dough all day long.
And of course, the bakery case! Filled with all the goodies!
Til this day, a well presented and beautiful display of sweet treats is one of my favorite things in the world! Perhaps it reminds me of the simpler times!
Bittersweet.
So maybe I’ll just keep trying to recreate what those feelings mean to me in the form of delicious pastries and cakes!!
Anywho… the Walnut Cardamom Pastries I bring to you today are inspired by those Swedish Cardamom Rolls, such tempting little buns!
They’re on my list of things to make. You can check them out here if you’ve never seen them.
For mine, I used homemade puff pastry spiked with cardamom.
You can use pre-made puff pastry and just make the filling for the Walnut Cardamom Pastries. The cardamom taste won’t be as intense, but maybe you can sprinkle a dash more cardamom in the filling if you want to.
It’s really not hard to make it from scratch. If you like to bake, you’ll love making your own puff pastry! In the recipes I give you all the instructions.
So, after you make your puff pastry, roll it out to 10″x16″. Spread filling on top.
Fold it letter style.
Cut stripes with a pizza cutter.
Now, to roll the little cardamom pastries, you’re going to hold one end of the stripe with your left hand, then you are going to roll the right end of the stripe with your right hand, against the counter, towards yourself. Like the picture shows.
Roll it over itself to form the little buns. Tuck the end under it.
The first couple rolls probably won’t be as cute, but as you get the hang of it, they will be beautiful! Just make sure to tuck the end under it so the roll doesn’t open up when it bakes.
Place pastries in a baking sheet.
Insert baking sheet in the freezer for about 15 minutes, while your oven pre-heats. Because you want the butter in the filling and in the puff pastry to enter the oven in solid state.
If you start to bake the puff pastries while they are room temperature, the butter will immediately start to melt as it enters the oven.
This is a little tip that is valid for most cookies and flaky pastries that take butter in the recipe.
You can use store-bought puff pastry, but I do provide you with a recipe and instructions to make it from scratch. Super easy.
Alright, so I guess that’s it for today folks. Take a look at my other post where I use this same puff pastry recipe to make Strawberry Pop-Tarts.
Walnut Cardamom Pastries
Ingredients
Puff Pastry
- 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 teaspoon cardamom seeds ground (I like to grind whole seeds)
- 14 tablespoons unsalted butter 1 stick plus 6 tablespoons
- 6-7 tablespoons ice water
Walnut Cardamom Filling
- 6 tablespoons butter softened
- 1/2 cup brown sugar
- 1/2 teaspoon cardamom seeds ground
- 1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
- 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
- 3/4 cup walnuts
Instructions
Puff Pastry dough
- Cut butter into small 1/2” pieces and stick it in the freezer for about 15 minutes.
- In the bowl of a food processor add flour, salt and cardamom. Add butter to food processor and process about 10-20 times until butter pieces are almost all incorporated into flour. When butter pieces are a bit smaller than the size of a pea, it’s time to stop. Do a couple pulses at a time and keep checking.
- Drizzle ice water over mixture and process 3-4 times to combine. Transfer dough to the counter and work it minimally just enough to turn it into a ball. Don’t overwork your dough, otherwise it will be tough and not as flaky.
- Form mixture into a 7 inch square, wrap it in plastic and refrigerate for 30 minutes.
- After 30 minutes, remove dough from the fridge and roll it out into a large rectangle, measuring about 16x10”. Fold it letter style, wrap it and refrigerate it again. Folding the dough letter style means you’ll think of the widest side of the dough as divided into 3 parts, then you are going to fold one end all the way up to 2/3 of the length and then fold the other end over.
- After 30 minutes, do the same thing again, now rolling the dough from the open sides. Fold it letter style and refrigerate again. Repeat this once more after 30 minutes. And then, refrigerate the dough for a couple hours before using.
- Finally, you can roll the dough out to a 16”x10” rectangle, roughly.
- Brush filling evenly over the whole surface.
- Fold like letter style again. Bring the narrow bottom to 2/3 of the way and then fold the other 1/3 piece over dough. Just like you fold a letter.
- Using a pizza cutter, cut strips of dough about 1/2” thick. Refer to the post for pictures.
- Roll each strip of dough by holding the left side of a strip and rolling the right side over itself, against the counter, towards you. (Again, refer to pictures on the post)
- Now, make a pinwheel with each twirled strip.
- Place it on a baking sheet and freeze for 15 minutes while you pre-heat the oven.
- Pre-heat oven to 375F.
- Bake pastries for 10-15 minutes, check in between. Remove from the oven once pastries are golden brown.
- The fresher you eat it, the better. Store for up to a day in air-tight container and re-heat it in the oven for 5 minutes at 350F before eating it again.
Walnut Cardamom Filling
- Start with the walnuts, if your walnuts aren’t roasted, make sure to roast them first. Spread walnuts in a baking sheet and roast on pre-heated 350F oven for 5-10 minutes, until slightly golden.
- Grind nuts in a food processor until they are coarse. You don’t want huge pieces, but you don’t want it to be a paste. You still want a lot of texture in your filling.
- Mix all ingredients together.
Nutrition
I love these flavors and thanks for the demo on rolling these pastries. Pinning for later.
Thank you, Jere!
These look great and I always did want to try making my own puff pastry. Thanks!
Thank you Ali! Making puff pastry is super easy!! You’ll love it!
My grandmother on my dad’s side was also always covered in flour. When she died, I got her recipe book with her hand-written recipes, and I love it!
These pastries look so comforting! I can imagine one with a big cup of coffee!
Thank you Cathleen!
These look absolutely beautiful and can’t not wait to try these. I always wanted to know how to make these pretty knots.
I need to make these!! They look so fantastic! I always appreciate your tutorial photos so we know exactly what we’re doing 🙂
Oh my goodness these pastries look absolutely fantastic! I love cardamom, and cannot wait to try these!
Thanks, Casey!
So scrumptious looking! Excited to try this 😀 Would the 1/2 tsp cardamom seeds be equivalent to 1/2 tsp ground cardamom?
Hi, Catherine! I’m so happy with your comment! And the answer to your question is: not exactly! About 6 small pods of cardamom will be equivalent to 1/2 teaspoon of ground cardamom! 🙂 Have a great day!
Such sweet memories! I love cardamom rolls (and we Norwegians do not call them Swedish!) and adding walnuts sounds so tasty! Walnuts and cardamom is a great combination
Yes, very sweet memories!! Thank you so much!
You used homemade puff pastry crust?! That is impressive. I love cardamom and you made the puff pastry look easy, I’m tempted!
Yes, it’s very easy to make homemade puff pastry! You should give it a try, Alyssa!!
Nothing beats homemade pastries. Nothing! These look and sound absolutely delicious – I’m loving this flavor combo – and can’t wait to give this a try!!!
I love things with walnuts in them and these sound so delicious,especially with the flavour of cardamom! I love adding cardamom to dishes.
Cardamom is one of my favorite spices! Thank you!
I bet growing up in a family of bakers was awesome, I grew up in a family of butchers and that very much colours the complexion of my cooking too. These sound delicious, I love the idea of the cardamom and walnut combination.
Awe, yes! Growing up in a bakery definitely has shaped who I am as a person and as a cook! Thanks for sharing your experience too, Brian!
These pastries look divine. I love anything with walnuts, sweet or savoury! I’m not much of a pastry chef but I feel inspired to try them!
These are very easy to make, even if you’re not a pastry chef, you’d have a great time making this!
These pastries look so delicious! I wouldn’t mind having one with my coffee just about now! YUM!
Right, I’m sitting here wishing I froze a couple so I could have them with my own coffee haha
What sweet memories you have! These pastries look amazing and I love how you shaped them. Thank you for providing step-by-step pictures too. It’s super helpful.
Very sweet memories, thank you so much, Marie!