Adult Cherry, Apricot, and Crystalized Ginger Pop Tarts

The Pop Tarts you dreamed of as a child have materialized with these Adult Cherry, Apricot, and Crystalized Ginger Pop Tarts.

Breakfast. touted to be the most important meal of the day, it is a mantra that has been drilled into our society and heads for decades.  Yet the thing that perplexes me is how inventive humans get in disguising cake and pies as full on breakfast foods. Pancakes and waffles are merely cake batter pan fried on either a griddle or crisped up in a waffle iron.  Modern cupcakes masquerade as Muffins who lack their decorative little frosting caps.  Strudels and danishes are basically a mini pie.  Some food for thought, and it is beyond time we call a spade a spade, and a pie a pie.

One of these secret dessert starters of the day is the innocuous and iconic Pop Tart.  If you deconstruct this little breakfast pastry down to the sum of its parts, you have pie dough, pie filling that is perilously gelatinous, and in most cases these days, frosting.  Pie, without being in the traditional 9 inch pie pan, with a higher crust to filling ratio.  Now there is not a thing wrong with this concept, except that Pop Tarts are very much a nostalgia food for many adults.  That little double treasure in crinkled foil that was so special and the height of cool for an after school snack when you were a kidlet sadly is hugely disappointing in adulthood.  The crust texture is off, the filling sickly sweet, and the icing hard enough to break your teeth in. 

Gran Marnier is the secret ingredient that makes these Pop Tarts so adult!!

When I discovered my love for this piecrust, I knew I wanted to recreate an adult version of the iconic Pop Tart.  One of the flavors I was never crazy about when I was a child is cherry, as it so often teeters between the line of too sweet and medicinal.  However, my tastebuds changed as I got older and I am discovering that I love fresh cherries, and cooked cherries if they are spiced in a balanced way!!!  There is actually a cranberry relish that gave me some inspiration for the filling for this Pop Tart, as it had both Gran Marnier and Crystalized Ginger in it.  Both of those flavors can very quickly become overwhelming for the palate, so I knew it was important to get the balance correct with the spice, the sweet, the salt, and the tart.

I tested different bake times and different glazes and think that this final recipe is a winning combination.  The pie dough is flaky, buttery, and rich, the filling is sweet from the cherries and the dried apricots, spiced with a hint of crystalized ginger and the Gran Marnier, a bit of bright acidity to cut through the sweetness from the lemon juice, and the tartness is echoed once again in part of the icing.  A sprinkle of Pink Himalayan Sea Salt adds the earthy, salty balance needed to tie everything together.

I paired my Adult Cherry, Apricot, and Crystalized Ginger Pop Tarts with milk, but I bet it would pair great with a terrific whisky on the rocks if you want to be super adult!

Since I tested these in three mini batches, I have a few nuggets of info that may be helpful when you create these guys.

To make this a quick process, you can split the work into two days if you don’t want to be tied to your kitchen all day.  First, you can make this pie dough and get it chilling in the fridge.  It will make enough dough for 6 pop tarts, 7 if you take the time to put the leftover scraps of dough together and re-chill and preroll it out, but that’s completely up to you if you want to do that for one extra pop tart.  While the dough is bonding together in the fridge, you can make the Cherry Apricot filling, then chill it in an airtight container overnight if you want to make it the next day.

I highly, highly recommend chilling the filling after you cook it in the saucepan.  This will ensure that the pie dough does not get too warm and have the butter melt (you need that butter as cold as you can get it to get those flaky layers!!). I baked a batch when it was warm and I did notice the pastry was not quite as flaky as when the filling was cold.  

I roll the pie dough out on a floured piece of parchment paper.  This makes it easier to handle and transfer to the baking sheet where you stuff the Pop Tarts.

I bake these in the oven at 400 F on Convection Oven setting.  The constant heat assists pastries to bake evenly and actually assist in creating more flaky pastry.  I also recommend baking a minute or two longer than you think you need to, as these Pop Tarts are meant to be held and you do not want them flopping over.  

After filling the Pop Tarts, I cover them with plastic wrap and chill for 15 minutes before popping them into the oven.  Again, the reasoning for this is to ensure that the butter stays cold before baking to help create those flaky layers in the pastry.

Take a bite out of these Adult Cherry, Apricot, and Crystalized Ginger Pop Tarts!!

Adult Cherry, Apricot, and Crystalized Ginger Pop Tarts

Author:  Iris Anna Gohn

Servings: 6

These Pop Tarts are everything that my childhood self remembers Pop Tarts to be, only a million times better.  The filing is luscious, viscous, and all the flavors meld beautifully together.  The pastry is crisp and crackles between your teeth, and the icings sweeten and add a tart component to the savory, spiced, sweetness of the cherries and pastry dough.  

If you want to be REALLY prepared, you can make these up to the point of baking, and freeze them.  It would add maybe 5 to 10 minutes to the baking time straight from the freezer, and I’d say they would keep to up to 2 months in the freezer.

These really are best the day of baking, but if you happen to have one leftover just pop it into a toaster oven (or big oven) for a few minutes to re crisp the pie dough the next day. They’re glorious warm, with a glass of milk.

Ingredients

For the Cherry, Apricot, and Crystalized Ginger Filling:

• 3 Cups diced Fresh Cherries (sweet not tart Cherries)
• 1/3 cup diced dried Apricots
• 1 Tbsp minced Crystalized Ginger
• 1/3 Cup Granulated Sugar
• 1/4 Cup Water plus up to 2 additional Tbsp if needed
• 1 1/2 to 2 Tbsp Cornstarch
• 3/4 Tsp Gran Marnier
• 1 Tbsp Fresh Lemon Juice (half a Lemon)
• Pinch of Sea Salt, to taste

For the Pink and White Icings:

• 1 1/2 Cup Confectioners Sugar, divided
• 1 Tbsp Fresh Lemon Juice
• 1-2 Tbsp Milk
• 2 Tbsp reserved Cherry Filling 
• Pinch of Sea Salt, to taste

For Finishing touches:

• 1 Egg + 1 Tbsp Water, for Egg Wash
• Pink Himalayan Sea Salt
• Sprinkles 

Directions

For the Cherry ApricotFilling:

1. Prep your Pie dough.  See Recipe here.
2. Pit and chop your cherries into quarters.  Chop the dried apricots into roughly the same size as your cherry pieces.  Mince the crystalized ginger fine as you want the essence of the flavor, rather than big chunks of it in the filling.
3. Over medium high heat, heat the prepared cherries, apricots, crystalized ginger, sugar, water, cornstarch, and Gran Marnier until it hits a roaring boil.  Let it boil and thicken for a minute then reduce the heat.  The mixture will cook down and thicken, and when the sauce evenly coats the back of a spoon and you can swipe a distinct line through it it is done and needs to be taken off the heat.
4. Add the lemon juice and the salt, and cool mixture completely.

For the Icings (To be made while the Pop Tarts are baking):

1. In one small bowl, mix 1 Cup of the Confectioners sugar with the reserved cherry filling, milk, and a pinch of salt.  You want the consistency to be thick, but still runny enough to pour out of a spoon.  
2. In another small bowl, mix the remaining 1/2 Cup Confectioners sugar with the Lemon Juice.  The mixture should be slightly thicker than the pink frosting, and taste pretty tart and sweet.

To Assemble and Bake:

1. Preheat oven to 400 F on Convection Setting if you have it.  Line 2 Baking sheets with parchment Paper and set aside.
2. In a small bowl, beat the egg and water together to make an egg wash.  Set aside.
3. Roll out 1/2 the pie dough into about a 9x13 rectangle on a floured parchment paper.  It should be roughly 1/8th inch thick.
4. Using a pizza cutter, trim the ends so the dough becomes a clean rectangle.  Then divide the rolled out dough into 3 equal pieces.
5. Lay the cut pieces of dough on one prepared baking sheet.  Spoon about 2-3 Tbsp of the Cherry Apricot filling into a slim rectangle on each of the prepared pie dough pieces.  
6. Take your finger or a pastry brush and spread egg wash all around the edges of the entire pie dough.  Then fold the top down over the filling.  Crimp all the edges of the dough with a fork.  This will seal in the filling as it cooks.  Poke holes down the center of the pastry.  If you need to trim the edges of the Pop Tart to ensure crisp edges, use the pizza cutter.  When the first 3 are prepared, cover with plastic wrap and put in the fridge to cool while you prepare the last 3.
7. Once all 6 Pop Tarts have been assembled and chilled, quickly brush each Pop Tart thoroughly with the egg wash.  Bake for a minimum of 25 minutes.  I found mine were perfect consistency and texture at 27 minutes int he oven, but some ovens run a little hotter and a little cooler than mine.  
8. Once the Pop Tarts have baked to perfection, immediately remove from the hot pan and cool on a wire rack.  Make sure the Pop Tarts are COMPLETELY cool before you add the icings, as you do not want the icing to melt immediately once drizzled on.
9. Once the Pop Tarts are cool, completely spread the tops with the Pink Icing.  Then thinly drizzle the tart white icing in a zigzag pattern.  Sprinkle the salt sparingly and then the sprinkles.  The icings should set within 10 minutes once applied to the Pop Tarts.