These are a super quick treats to make a cute spooky season.
PREP TIME: 5 minutes
COOK TIME: 15 minutes
TOTAL TIME: 30 minutes
SERVING SIZE: 8 – 10
DIET: VEGAN
Ingredients
- 2 sheets of puff pastry (I use JusRoll vegan & gluten-free puff pastry sheets)
- 100g of fresh / frozen blueberries
- 50g of caster / granulated sugar (plus extra for sprinkling)
- 2 tablespoons of cornstarch / cornflour
- 2 teaspoon of lemon juice
- 50g of icing sugar
- Puff pastry : You want to use a vegan friendly puff pastry. The puff pastry I use is from the brand JusRoll. This pastry is also gluten-free making this recipe wheat-free! Supermarkets such as Tesco, ASDA and sainsburys stock JusRoll. You can also find own-brand puff pastry, just make sure to check the ingredients to make sure it’s suitable for vegans.
- Blueberries : You can use either fresh or frozen blueberries for the filling. I personally like to use half and half. This makes the filling have a little extra texture which is really tasty with the flakey pastry.
- Sugar : You can use granulated sugar or a fine water / caster sugar. This will thicken and sweeten the filling and will also help with the golden, crispy pastry.
- Cornstarch / cornflour : This helps the compote / filling to thicken. If you don’t add it, the filling wont jellify, meaning it’ll be very runny.
- Lemon juice : I added a squeeze of lemon to the icing, it pairs perfectly with the fruity, blueberry filling. You could also use dairy-free milk, water or almond extract works really well!
- Icing sugar : To top the pastries, add a little icing / glaze. It makes them even more delicious. Always sieve the icing to remove any clumps.
STEPS
- Pre-heat oven to 180°C fan and line 2 baking trays with grease-proof paper.
- Unroll the pastry sheets leaving in the baking paper. Use a rolling pin to slightly flatten out any wrinkles in the pastry.
- Use a ghost shaped cookie cutter to chomp out the shapes. Alternatively you can use a template / hand cut ghost shapes using a knife. Roll out the scraps to cut out a few more shapes.
- To half of the ghosts, use the small tip of a medium piping tip to cut out the two eyes. Use the larger end of the tip to cut out the mouth. Only do this with half of the ghosts as these will be the top pastry.
- In a medium sized saucepan, add in the blueberries, cornstarch / cornflour, sugar and lemon juice.
- Place the blueberries into a medium-sized saucepan and sprinkle over the sugar, cornflour / cornstarch and 1 teaspoon of lemon juice.
- Place on top onto the hob over a medium to high heat and bring to the boil. This will take around 5-8 minutes. Keep stirring with a heatproof spatula or wooden spoon to prevent the mixture from sticking and burning, being careful not to burst the blueberries too much as you want some to stay whole. It will start to turn thick. Once thick, remove from the heat and allow to cool before using. As it cools, it will thicken up even more and turn jelly-like.
- Spoon some of the blueberry filling into the middle of the ghost shapes (only the ones without the faces).
- Brush some water around the edge of the pastry, this will help the pastry stick. Tip: Don’t add too much filling or it will ooze out when baking.
- Lay one of the ghost pastries with the face on top, pressing the edges down to stick. Use a fork to crimp the edges together. This will prevent the filling oozing out.
- Brush the tops of the pastries with some dairy-free milk and sprinkle over some sugar. This will help the browning of the pastry.
- It’s best to bake the pies a tray at a time as the pastry will puff up. I like to bake 5-6 on a tray at a time. Place into the middle of the pre-heated oven and bake for 15-18 minutes or until golden in colour and the pastry is flakey.
- Remove from the oven and allow to cool slightly on the tray then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.
- Mix the icing sugar and some lemon juice together until runny. Drizzle the glaze over the tops of the pastries. Set aside for 5 minutes to set.
- Tuck in and enjoy!
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