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eccles cakes British puff pastry recipe

Eccles Cakes

These little pastries are a British tea time favourite, filled with currants, candied rind, and spices. This recipe makes 12.

Course Breakfast, Dessert
Cuisine British
Keyword christmas, cinnamon, currants, eccles cakes, puffy pastry
Servings 6

Ingredients

  • 1/2 batch Simple Puff Pastry (See recipe notes for the link)
  • 1/2 cup currants
  • 2 Tbsp chopped mixed peel
  • 1 Tablespoon sugar
  • 1/4 tsp ground cinnamon
  • 2 Tbsp butter softened
  • 1/4 tsp ground nutmeg
  • 1 large egg beaten with 1 tsp water (for the egg wash)
  • coarse sugar for sprinkling

Instructions

  1. Prepare the pastry as per the recipe instructions. Chill for at least 20 minutes.

  2. In a medium sized mixing bowl, combine the currants, mixed peel, sugar, and spices. Mix in the butter, using your fingertips to make sure that it evenly coats the fruit mixture.

  3. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.

  4. On a lightly floured clean work surface, roll out the pastry into a 9"x12" rectangle. Cut into squares, and spoon the filling into the centre of each square until it is evenly divided. Gather up the corners of the squares over the filling, and pinch to seal, folding the sharp ends in and shaping with your fingers into a round cookie shape. Turn upside down onto a parchment lined cookie sheet, and press down slightly to flatten.

    Alternatively, you can just roll the dough out, cut into circles with a biscuit cutter, and fill that way. Continue rolling and cutting the scraps until all of the eccles cakes are made.

  5. Using a sharp knife, cut 2 little slits in the tops of each cake. Brush with egg wash, and sprinkle with coarse sugar.

  6. Bake for 20-25 minutes or until golden brown and puffy. Cool on wire racks. Like most pastries, eccles cakes are best served on the day they are made.

Recipe Notes

Recipe link: Simple Puff Pastry Recipe

Tips:  

If cutting the pastry into circles, do not overwork the pastry!  Try to get as many cakes as you can out of it each time you roll it out. I would not bother re-rolling the same dough out more than 2x after the first batch. Extra trimmings can be pressed together with your fingers to make more circles, or just baked as they are with sugar on top. Overworking the pastry will cause the butter to work in too much, and you'll lose the flakiness of the pastry.
 
Use a cookie sheet with sides!  This will prevent the butter from dripping off the sides of the pan and making a smokey mess in your oven.