Apple Turnovers That Melt In Your Mouth, Made With Whole Wheat Flour!

There's nothing quite as delicious as warm spicy apple filling encased in a buttery pastry crust.  My husband especially enjoyed these apple turnovers, which he proved by eating six of them...  At the time that I made these, I was running out of white flour and the only thing I had left was whole wheat flour... The good news however, is that the addition turned out to be delicious, and it gave these buttery pastries an edge in the health department! Now, on to the recipe!

Flaky Apple Turnovers,
adapted from "Cook's Illustrated Holiday Baking, Holiday 2006"

Ingredients

Puff Pastry
1 1/2 Cups White Flour
1/2 Cup Whole Wheat Flour
1 Tbsp Sugar
1 Tsp Salt
16 Tbsp Cold Unsalted Butter
6 Tbsp Ice Water
1 Tsp Lemon Juice

Apple Filling
1 lb Granny Smith Apples (3-4)
1 Cup Sugar
2 Tsp Lemon Juice
1/4 Tsp Salt
1/2 Tsp Cinnamon

Cinnamon Sugar
1/2 Cup Sugar
2 Tsp Cinnamon

Egg Wash
1 Egg White
1 Tbsp Water

To start out, you need to make the puff pastry.  Put the flour, sugar and salt into the bowl of a food processor and add 4 Tbsp of the butter.  Pulse this until the butter is chopped into dime sized pieces, by the way, it should only take about 4 seconds.  Then add the rest of the butter and pulse the food processor for 2 more seconds.  Your butter will be really chunky, but don't worry, that is what we want.  Place this mixture into a medium sized bowl.

Next, combine the ice water with the lemon juice and add 3 Tbsp of this to the flour butter mixture.  Toss until it is just barely combined, then add the remaining water and toss some more.  Make sure you mix it only very lightly.  The point here is to end with large chunks of butter still in your dough.


Then turn your dough out onto a floured work surface and press it together as best you can.  In short brisk strokes you are going to take the palm of your hand and push it down and forward in the dough, until you have worked every portion of the dough and it is all spread out again.  Gather the dough back together and repeat.  Gather the dough back together again, wrap it in plastic wrap and chill it in the fridge for 30 minutes.

 While we wait for the dough to chill, we are going to prepare the apples.  Peel the apples, cut them in four pieces and core them.  Then you are going to grate them, being careful not to grate your fingers in the process.  Put the grated apples into a bowl and add the sugar, lemon juice, salt and cinnamon. Mix it all up and put this mixture in a colander set over the bowl you just used. Cover this with plastic wrap and set it in the fridge.

By this time your dough should be just about ready.  Remove it from the fridge, unwrap and place it on a floured piece of parchment paper.  Roll the dough into a 15x10 inch rectangle...

Then fold it lengthwise into 3rds...

Now roll this piece of dough from right to left (or left to right), until you get something that looks like this...










If the dough is starting to get soft and sticky then you want to put it back in the fridge to chill for 10-20 minutes until it firms back up.  To make flaky dough you must maintain the integrity of the cold butter in the dough.  If it gets too warm, these butter pieces melt and your dough will be more hard than flaky. When the dough is ready, repeat the process of rolling the dough into a 15x10 inch rectangle, folding it, and rolling it up.  Again, you may need to stick it back in the fridge after this second rolling to make sure it stays cold.


Finally, you are going to roll the dough into an 18 inch square. Then use a ruler to cut the dough to a precise 15 inch square. A pizza or ravioli cutter works great to make nice straight cuts!

After this is done, you are going to cut the dough into 9, 5inch squares...

At this point my dough was getting soft again, so I separated the pieces with parchment paper and popped them in the freezer for 5 minutes to firm them up. Now is the time to preheat your oven to 375 degrees F.

Remove the dough squares from the freezer, and place 2 Tbsp of the apple mixture into the centers of each. Using a pastry brush, lightly brush the edges of the pastry with egg wash. Fold the pastry in half over the egg mixture, and press the edges with the tines of a fork to seal.  Then carefully place them on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper using a spatula, and pop them back in the freezer for 5 minutes.

Remove them from the freezer after they have had time to chill, and brush each one with egg wash.  Sprinkle each turnover with cinnamon sugar mixture, and cut a slit in the tops of each to allow hot air to escape.  Finally, pop them in the preheated oven for 18-22 minutes until they are golden brown and delicious!






Now sit back, relax, and enjoy! My family of four ate all nine of them in under an hour! I love apple desserts! What are your favorite fruit desserts?