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This Apple Cheese Danish is a flakey breakfast treat that can be made in less than 30 minutes, from start to finish. The flavors of apple pie mixed with a creamy filling and topped with icing. Pair this danish with these matcha lattes , olive oil fried eggs and best lemon ricotta pancakes.
Ingredients for Apple Cheese Danish
- Puff Pastry – I like using all-butter frozen puff pastry (I find Dufour is a good brand). If you want to make something homemade, I have a recipe for Rough Puff!
- Apples – Any good baking apple will do great here. I prefer using Honeycrisp because they’re readily available and I can use them for baking or for a salad.
- Cream cheese – This adds a delicious creamy filling to this danish.
- Lemon zest – I think a hint of brightness is great paired with the fragrant apples and buttery puff pastry.
- Spices – Is it even autumn if you don’t have spices like cinnamon?
For the rest of the ingredient list, please refer to the recipe index card below.
How to Make this Apple Cheese Danish
- Mix the cheese filling. You’re going to start by throwing all of the filing ingredients in a bowl and mixing them up. It’ll smell tart. And delicious.
- Prep the Apples. After that, you want to slice the apples and toss them with a little lemon juice, sugar and cinnamon.
- Take your defrosted puff pastry and roll it out. Mine was an annoying circle, so I had to cut it into a rectangle. No biggie!
- Trim the Puff Pastry. Cut off the top corners and make triangular notches in the bottom part of the rectangle. Then make slits down both sides. Those are gonna be the pretty braids.
- Fill! Fill the center with a few tablespoons of the cream cheese mixture and smooth it out then lay the apple slices down the center…
- Form the pastry. Fold in the bottom and top flaps and then braid! Sorta. This is when it gets really easy. Simply fold over the strips, alternating between sides.
- Visuals! If you need more visuals, this video really helps!
- Finish and Bake. Trim away any leftover strips or dough.Brush it with a little egg wash action, stick in the oven and bake.
- Make the Icing. While it’s doing its thing in the oven, mix up the icing. Just powdered sugar and a tiny bit of milk. I had to play with the consistency a bit. I wanted it to be thick.
- Ice and Serve! Pour it all over the warm apple cheese danish and let it cool completely or just slightly and serve.
Tips and Tricks:
- Switch up the apples. I used honey crisp apples in these, however any sort of baking apple would work in these. You don’t want anything too tart because you want it to compliment the cream cheese and lemon layer, not compete. For example, Braeburn or Gala would be perfect in here
- Try other fruit. If apples aren’t in season or you’ve got some other fresh fruit to use just substitute those instead of the apples, but not too many or you’ll have a juicy problem. Just enough to cover the cheese filling. You could even go with pears too!
- Go the classic cheese danish route. If you don’t want any fruit just make the cheese filling and skip the apples, as a result you’ll get a good classic cheese danish!
Recipe FAQs
Can I make this with pie dough?
I’ve gotten this question quite a bit and I just don’t think it’ll be the same. It won’t be this flakey deliciousness. But you definitely can! It’ll be more like these apple hand pies!
Can I make these with pears?
Yes, but be sure to use baking pears, like Bosc, Bartlett or Anjou. These won’t break down as easily while baked.
Can this be made ahead?
Absolutely. You can actually freeze this completely and bake it from
frozen. You may need an additional 5 to 10 minutes in the oven.
Can I make these with a softer dough?
Absolutely. You can use a brioche-like dough and they’d be similar to my Berry Cheese Danish.
What to Serve with This Apple Cheese Danish
Here are some breakfast favorites that would accompany this grandly!
- Breakfast Burritos
- Custard French Toast with Macerated Strawberries
- Matcha Latte
- Iced Pumpkin Spice Lattes
- Apple Cider Doughnut Muffins
If you tried this Apple Cheese Danish or any other recipe on my website, please leave a 🌟 star rating and let me know how it went in the 📝 comments below. Thanks for visiting!
Apple Cheese Danish Recipe
This apple cheese danish is the combo of the classic cheese danish and warm slices of apple, like apple pie meets cheese danish!
Video
Ingredients
For the Filling:
- 4 oz cream cheese, room temperature
- 2 tablespoons ricotta or mascarpone cheese
- 1 lemon , zest and juice, divided
- Pinch kosher salt
- 5 tablespoons white granulated sugar, divided
- 2 apples , (such as Honey crisp, Braeburn or Gala)
- 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
For the Assembly and Icing:
- 1 box puff pastry
- 3/4 cup powdered sugar, sifted
- 1 tablespoon whole milk
Instructions
To Make the Filling:
- Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.
- In a medium bowl, place the cream cheese, ricotta, lemon zest, vanilla, salt, 4 tablespoons of sugar and mix until smooth, using an electric mixer fitted with a paddle attachment. Set aside.
- Peel and slice your apples into 1/4-inch slices. In a small bowl toss them with the remaining 1 tablespoon of juice from the one lemon, sugar, and cinnamon.
To Assemble the Cheese Danish:
- Carefully unfold 1 sheet of defrosted puff pastry and roll slightly with a floured rolling pin until it's about 1/4-inch in thickness. I trimmed mine so it was a 11" x 8" rectangle. Transfer the sheet of puff pastry to a piece of parchment that's on a baking sheet.
- At an angle, slice off the top corners and cut two notches in the bottom. Slice 1-inch strips diagonally down both sides of the puff pastry, leaving the center uncut. Try to cut the same amount of strips on both sides. I had about 8 strips per side.
- Add three tablespoons of cream cheese filling, spreading it evenly down the center of the puff pastry. Top with apple slices.
- Fold in the bottom and top flaps. Braid the puff pastry, by folding the strips over the filing, alternating sides, until you've worked your way down the puff pastry. Using your knife, trim off any leftover strips or extra dough.
- Transfer the danish to the freezer to chill for 15 minutes.
- Brush with egg wash liberally. Transfer baking sheet to oven and bake for about 20 minutes, or until puffed up and golden brown.
To Make the Icing:
- In a medium bowl, combine the powedered sugar with the milk. Mix until combined. When the danish comes out of the oven, drizzle top with icing and serve warm.
Notes
Tips and Tricks:
- Switch up the apples. I used honey crisp apples in these, however any sort of baking apple would work in these. You don’t want anything too tart because you want it to compliment the cream cheese and lemon layer, not compete. For example, Braeburn or Gala would be perfect in here
- Try other fruit. If apples aren’t in season or you’ve got some other fresh fruit to use just substitute those instead of the apples, but not too many or you’ll have a juicy problem. Just enough to cover the cheese filling. You could even go with pears too!
- Go the classic cheese danish route. If you don’t want any fruit just make the cheese filling and skip the apples, as a result you’ll get a good classic cheese danish!
Nutrition
Serving: 4g | Calories: 250kcal | Carbohydrates: 24g | Protein: 3g | Fat: 21g | Saturated Fat: 12g | Polyunsaturated Fat: 5g | Monounsaturated Fat: 2g | Cholesterol: 32mg | Sodium: 43mg | Potassium: 54mg | Fiber: 8g | Sugar: 24g | Vitamin A: 356IU | Vitamin C: 8mg | Calcium: 34mg | Iron: 7mg
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
Like this Recipe? Please Rate & comment below!
I think my husband would fall over in utter bliss if I made this for him!
I had un-cool school lunches, too. Bread that was not only whole wheat, but RECTANGULAR instead of square. And filled with crunchy natural peanut butter and honey.
It’s crazy how things come full circle. As much as I ‘hated’ my parents for packing me healthful, uncool school lunches, that’s what my kids will get! I wonder if I’ll have it in me to get them to ‘cool’ status somehow.
I wish this recipe magically yielded 10 of these lovely things! Two would definitely not be enough. Two would be like, enough to make sure they turned out okay. Maybe I can find a mega-pack of pastry dough and make a mega pile of them!
Our dads must be brothers–mine got me men’s sunglasses and deodorant because they were “better” too. No prom queen here.
great description – “fall in a bowl” love it!! 🙂 these look yummy!!
I just adored this post. I was totally not the cool girl (and I also didn’t know how to use a hair dryer…or styling products). But we grow up to be pretty cool… 🙂
ok, so 1) your writing is just too cute & funny. so glad to have discovered your blog!, and 2) cheese danishes are totally a weakness of mine and this looks so good! i need take a crack at it, like, immediately! thanks! ^_^
Do you do all of this on parchment paper and then just plop onto a baking sheet? if so…brilliant! I just moved to a new place and we have a horrible 70’s kitchen with those disgusting grout-y tiles (major downgrade from granite counters). So I have been needing to find a solution to rolling things out without going and buying one of those rolling mats…because a trip to the cooking supply store is too dangerous!
Yes! I did everything on the parchment and then transfered (the parchment) to a baking sheet. I recommend it because you want to avoid having to pick up the danish. (You just braided it so you don’t want it falling apart!!) P.S. I have that same type of kitchen counters. I bet giving it a good cleaning would be totally fine. 😉
I was the weird quiet girl who did weird things to her bangs because I had frizzy hair and was unable to even put it in a ponytail. I’m still the weird (no longer quiet) girl who still can’t do a good ponytail, nevermind a braid. But that’s ok because I can bake and I want to bake that danish!! It looks sooo good!
I’ve been reading your blog for sometime now, but this post? Those apple cheese danish photos? Almost made me lick my screen.