The best Cheese Danish I ever had was at the Bellagio Hotel in Las Vegas, years ago when
we went with friends of ours.
That was at a time when I was cool and young, but you know, now I like to watch Law and
Order and veg out on the couch, but you know what, the question is:where's the best cheese
danish you ever had, and if you come back to me and tell me you were in the middle of
Paris somewhere having cheese danishes, I don't even want to hear because that's way
cooler than Bellagio Hotel.
Hi guys, I'm Laura Vitale and on this episode of Laura in the Kitchen, I'm going to share
with you how to make some delicious Raspberry Cheese Danishes, this recipe came from a suggestion
from one of you on my Instagram post where I asked what desserts would you like me to
make this time of year because it's kind of like the middle of - I don't want to say an
awkward time of year for desserts because, let's face it, that's just crazy, but you
know, it's just like an overload of holiday desserts, but the fresh fruit and yummy-ness
isn't out yet for Spring and Summer so we're kind of like in the middle of that, and one
of you suggested this and I was like yes, absolutely, right away!
So easy and simple, you can make them on a weekday or a weekend or if you're really living
large and taking charge, a weekend breakfast treat.
Right?
The list of ingredients, short and sweet but they're all the right ones.
You;ll need cream cheese, egg, sugar with a little pinch of salt, you;ll need an egg
yolk, your raspberry jam, any jam flavor really, puff pastry, and vanilla extract.
That is it, and that is all and it is so easy, now the puff pastry is of course, store bought,
I never make my own puff pastry, don't have the patience and you can buy a perfectly delicious
puff pastry in the frozen section of your grocery store worth every single penny.
And you're going to have a baking sheet lined with some - what is this? - parchment paper.
Alright so let's work on this, so you unrolled your piece of puff pastry, and what I do is
I just roll it our on a lightly floured surface and I just kind of roll this out until it's
about an inch bigger on all four sides, right?
I don't want it too thin so don't go crazy.
Just like that.
And then I'm going to cut this into - I'm only going to make four because I don't trust
myself I will eat all of them if I make eight.
So, I'm just going to cut this into four equal squares, and then I'm going to place them
on the parchment paper.
On the parchment paper lined baking sheet.
Shake off any excess, place them on there like so, and then we are going to start making
the filling.
Alright, so set those aside, let's work on the filling.
In this bowl, I've got the cream cheese, you need your egg yolk, your sugar, with a pinch
of salt, and a good splash of, really good this is homemade, my homemade vanilla extract.
Come close and then you'll see why it's important that you make your own and you find the best
kind that you can get your hands on.
You see those specks?
Those are all vanilla beans, so I want to get the best vanilla I can get my hands on
because that's where all of the flavor is and that's why I tend to make my own because
you can control all that.
You know what I'm saying?
Mix all of this together, this does not take very long at all.
Just make sure that it's all very well incorporated.
Set that aside.
Work on just whisking together the egg and that splash of water or milk, this is just
your egg wash.
It's important so don't leave it out.
And here's what we're going to do.
First thing's first, because I just find that - where are we going? - you take your knife,
okay? a sharp paring knife and you just take your corners, and you kind of just come, make
a slit about halfway, you see that?
On each corner, and you're going to do that to all of them.
And then you just - I just brush all of the edges, it just makes my life easier to do
it now.
And then you take a dollop or two of your cream cheese mixture, I'll just do one so
that you can see, and then I'll do the rest.
And then you put a dollop of your raspberry and this is where it gets really cool, you
take one corner, okay?
The top left, and then you meet it with this guy and you pinch that together, right?
And you form like a little flower.
And the egg wash that you put underneath kind of helps them all stick.
See?
And you're going to do that to all of them and they're so pretty when they bake that
I think it's worth going through the effort of doing it.
These look great, I'm going to pop these into the freezer for about twenty minutes, and
in the meantime I'm going to preheat the oven to 375F so I'm going to pop these in and I'll
show you what they look like before they go in the oven.
Alright, these were in the freezer for about twenty minutes and now you just take your
remaining egg wash and I just brush it all over any of the surfaces, all over the surface
whatever you want to call it.
Just because I like that it gives you beautiful golden brown color, so I'm just going to take
my time and do that and they're going to go into the oven for about ten to fifteen minutes
and I will show you what they look like when they are done.
These just came out of the oven, don't they look amazing?I didn't do the best job there
at pinching the centers but I think they just look absolutely amazing and if you let them
cool completely, and you just sprinkle them with some powdered sugar then I'm telling
you they are bakery worthy, and I want to show you something that might have made you
a little bit nervous when I was putting them together but I failed to mention it back then
so I'm going to mention it now.
The filling may seem a little bit runny, the cream cheese filling, but the reason why it's
important that it's a little bit runny is because you see how it oozes out, it's not
just in the very center, that cream cheese filling is now over here, over here, it kind
of oozes out, that means that - see right here?
You've got your cream cheese filling everywhere, that means that almost every single bite of
your danish is going to have some of that creamy delicious filling, but it's important
that you put these in the freezer for about fifteen minutes so that filling can harden
a little bit before you pop it into the oven because if you pop it straight into the oven,
that filling is going to ooze completely out of your pastry and it's going to end up on
your baking sheet so don't be worried if it seems a little bit runny.
I'm just going to cut this up a little bit.
I literally just popped these out of the oven.
The bottom is like perfect, but it is important that you pop these into the freezer to harden
that filling but don't be worried if it looks runny, it's meant to be that way.
Mmm!
Cheese danishes are one of my favorite things in the entire world to eat, add a little bit
of that raspberry jam, the tartness of it mixed with the sweetness of the cream cheese:
money maker!
LauraintheKitchen.com will have the recipe written for you, I hope that you enjoyed spending
time with me.
Try these out this weekend!
I hope you have enjoyed spending time with me and I will see you next time!
Bye.