These light, flaky Pain Aux Raisins are a quick and easy French pastry your whole family will love! This easy French recipe uses creamy custard, golden raisins, and a flaky puff pastry for a delightful treat!
WHAT IS PAIN AUX RAISINS
Pain Aux Raisins is a French pastry made out of a leavened butter pastry, cream, and raisins. Roughly translated pain aux raisins means raisin bread. This spiraled pastry is a simple dessert that can be found at any bakery in France. These are one of my favorite French pastries. I love the crispy layers baked with a creamy filling and the slight tang the apricot glaze and raisins bring to the dessert.
Pain aux raisins falls in the same category as pain aux chocolate and croissants because it uses a puff pastry dough. To get the beautiful layers in puff pastry, the dough is made by rolling out dough, adding a layer of rolled out butter, and tucking the butter into the dough. The dough is then rolled and folded over itself many times before being refrigerated and rolled and folded again. The process of making the puff pastry dough is often time consuming and can be difficult if the butter cools too much while being worked. For this reason I use a pre-made puff pastry to keep the recipe easy and enjoyable!
HOW TO MAKE EASY PAIN AUX RAISINS
INGREDIENTS
Puff Pastry- pre-made sheets of puff pastry provide this dessert with flaky, crispy layers.
Cream Filling– this homemade custard filling provides a smooth, creamy filling to hold the raisins in between the flaky layers.
Apricot glaze– a tangy finishing glaze, this apricot glaze is made from apricot preserves and water for the perfect finishing touch on these easy pastries.
PREPARE THE CUSTARD
Begin by preparing the custard for the pain aux raisins. In a pot, over low-medium heat, bring the milk to a boil. While the milk is heating, whisk together egg yolks, corn starch, sugar, vanilla, and lemon zest in a glass pyrex bowl.
When the milk begins to boil, pour the hot milk over the egg yolk mixture, whisking until smooth. Using a hand strainer, pour the custard through the strainer, back into the pot. This should remove any lumps. Whisk the custard in the pot until it thickens very well.
Add the butter into the custard and whisk until it melts. Remove the pot from the heat and transfer into a pyrex bowl. Cover with plastic wrap by placing the plastic wrap directly on the custard to cover the top layer of custard.
Allow custard to cool to room temperature before assembling the pastries.
ASSEMBLE TO PASTRIES
Preheat the oven to 400°F and line a sheet pan with parchment paper. Set aside.
To assemble the pastries, lay a sheet of puff pastry on a cutting board or on a clean countertop. Spread 3/4 cup of the cream filling on each sheet of puff pastry. Top the cream with raisins and roll the dough, along the long edge of the puff pastry, into a long log like you would make for cinnamon rolls.
Using a cooking floss, cut each roll into 8 pieces. If you would like larger pastries feel free to cut the rolls into 6 pieces.
Place the cut pastry rolls on the parchment paper lined sheet pan. Whisk the egg in a small bowl and brush each roll lightly with the egg.
Bake for 12-15 minutes until the pain aux raisins are golden in color. Right before the pastries come out of the oven, mix the apricot preserve and 1 Tbsp of water in a small bowl and microwave for 45 seconds.
When the pain aux raisins come out of the oven, brush them with the apricot glaze. Allow them to cool before eating.
HELPFUL TIPS TO MAKE PAIN AUX RAISINS
- Prepare the custard the night before and refrigerate, with the plastic wrap touching the top layer, for faster assembly.
- Make sure the puff pastry thaws before unfolding and filling with stuffings.
- Use a floss to slice the rolls instead of a knife, this prevents the rolls from unrolling while you slice them.
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OTHER DELICIOUS DESSERTS TO TRY
- Raspberry Puff Pastry Tart
- Strawberry French Tart
- Easy Chocolate Covered Strawberries
- Super Moist Pear Cake
Easy Pain Aux Raisins
Ingredients
- 2 sheets Puff Pastry thawed
- 1 Egg whisked
- ¼ c. Apricot Preserve
- 1 Tbsp. Water
- 1 c. Golden Raisins
- Cooking floss or thread
Cream Filling
- 2 c. Whole Milk
- ⅓ c. Corn Starch
- ½ c. Sugar
- 3 Egg Yolks
- 1 Tbsp. Vanilla Extract or ½ tsp Vanilla Bean
- 2 Tbsp. Butter
- ½ tsp. Lemon Zest
Instructions
To Prepare the Custard
- Bring the milk to a boil in a sauce pan over low-medium heat.
- While the milk heats, in a pyrex or glass bowl, whisk together egg yolks, corn starch, vanilla, and lemon zest.
- When the milk boils, carefully pour it over the egg yolk mixture and whisk until smooth.
- Using a hand strainer, pour the custard through the strainer and back into the sauce pan. Heat over medium-low heat and whisk until the custard begins to thicken up. Add in the butter and whisk until it melts.
- After the butter melts in, remove from heat. Transfer the custard to a glass bowl and cover with plastic wrap by placing the plastic wrap over the top layer of custard. Allow to cool to room temperature before assembling the pastries.
Assembling the Pastries
- To assemble the pastries, lay a sheet of puff pastry on a cutting board or a clean countertop. Spread ¾ cup of custard on each puff pastry sheet. Top each sheet of puff pastry with ½ cup of golden raisins.
- Roll the puff pastry along the long edge into a log. Using cooking floss, cut each roll into 8 pieces.
- Place the cut pieces on a sheet pan lined with parchment paper. In a small bowl, whisk the egg. Lightly brush each pastry with the egg wash.
- Bake for 12-15 minutes, until the pastries are golden in color.
- Right before the pastries come out, stir together the apricot preserves and water in a bowl and microwave for 45 seconds. Brush the apricot glaze onto the pain aux raisins when they come out of the oven.
- Allow pastries to cool before eating.
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