Pistachio Matcha Puff Pastry Wreath Recipe

Make this pistachio matcha puff pastry wreath recipe when you need an easy Christmas dessert recipe.

A couple of years ago I made a pistachio matcha puff pastry Christmas tree. And originally I wasn't going to do a similar recipe – but when a babka I planned to make fell through due to dead yeast, and I ran out of time to go out and get yeast and proof dough for it, I decided to replicate the wreath design I had in mind with puff pastry instead of babka dough.

Which resulted in this pistachio matcha puff pastry wreath recipe.

One of the best things about using ready-made, ready-rolled puff pastry is how quick and easy it is to use it to whip treats up. This time, the puff pastry I use all but melted – if you watch my YouTube video, you'll see how gooey it got (and how it's literally never happened to be before while working with the same kind of puff pastry). There is a solution, though: popping it in the freezer for a few minutes to firm back up again.

Because puff pastry is made with lots of butter (at least, traditional puff pastry is, some store-bought versions aren't), butter gets soft when it's warm. Apparently the batch I used had more butter than most, to have this reaction. At least it resulted in an extra-delicious puff pastry wreath, even if it added a bit more time to the process of making it.

Other than potentially having to re-chill misbehaving puff pastry, my pistachio matcha puff pastry recipe is relatively quick and easy, and needs minimal ingredients.

You can also watch me make this on my YouTube channel, Tashcakes:

Ready? Let's go.

Ingredients for Puff Pastry Wreath:

100g white chocolate
2 tsp matcha, sifted
1 box of ready-made, ready-rolled puff pastry
1 egg
Splash of milk
A sprinkling of raw slivered pistachios

To Decorate:

2 tbsp icing sugar
1 tsp matcha
1 tsp water (approx.)
Handful of dried cranberries

Method:

1. To make the puff pastry wreath filling, melt the white chocolate (either in short bursts in the microwave, or in a heatproof bowl over some barely-simmering water), and stir in the matcha.

2. Unroll the puff pastry sheet on its paper so that the long end is facing you. Evenly spread on your matcha chocolate, spreading it all the way to the shorter ends and long end closest to you, but leaving about 1cm space on the long end furthest away from you.

3. Roll it up tightly, starting from the long side closest to you and rolling away from you, and pop the log onto a tray (still on its paper) and into the freezer for half an hour.

4. Preheat the oven to 180°C. Take your puff pastry log out of the freezer, and slice lengthways so you have two long ropes.

5. With the cut sides facing up, gently cross one rope over the other, and make a twisted braid with the two ropes, making sure the cut sides are always facing upwards. If the chocolate filling has solidified too much from being in the freezer, let the heat of your hands soften it as you work to braid the two logs.

6. Form a ring with your braid of pastry, pinching the ends closed and tucking them underneath a little to help keep them together.

7. Make the glaze by whisking the egg with the dash of milk, and very lightly brush over the top of your wreath. Sprinkle over your handful of pistachio slivers so they stick to the glaze.

8. Bake for 20 minutes, loosely cover the top with foil to stop it from burning, and bake for a further 20 minutes.

9. Let it cool a little while you make the icing (simply stir the icing sugar and matcha together, followed by the water a little at a time until you have your desired consistency).

10. Drizzle over as much icing as you like over the still slightly-warm pastry, and dot on some dried cranberries. Serve immediately.

Enjoy, and have fun.