Lemon cream cheese puff pastry braid is a delicious, lemony, buttery treat made with ready-made puff pastry and a luxurious lemon cream cheese filling.
Preheat your oven to 400F. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and set aside (see notes).
Using a handheld electric mixer or a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat block of cream cheese, ¼ cup sugar, 7-oz lemon curd and pinch salt until smooth. Remember to scrape the sides and bottom of your bowl.
Take 1 puff pastry sheet and gently unfold on baking sheet. Cut strips on top, the bottom, and the sides (see photo). Try to keep each strip equal in size.
Place lemon curd cream cheese filling in the middle of your puff pastry and smoothen the top (see notes).
Fold puff pastry over the filling, overlapping each strip (see complete step-by-step photos in post). Refrigerate while you work on the next puff pastry.
Once you’ve done all 3 lemon cream cheese puff pastries, brush them with egg wash and bake for 30 minutes or until puffy and golden brown. Best served immediately.
OPTIONAL: To make an optional glaze for this braided puff pastry recipe, just stir about ¼ cup confectioner’s sugar with 1 tbsp milk until the sugar dissolves and you get a runny, pourable consistency. Drizzle while the pastries are still warm.
Video
Notes
Frozen puff pastry is usually sold here in boxes of 2, each sheet roughly 10x10 inches when first rolled out. If you get them in a significantly different size, adjust accordingly.
I use a big baking sheet that fits all 3 puff pastry braids. If you don’t have one that’s big enough, you can use 2 baking sheets and just position them in the middle rack of your oven, or you can bake the lemon pastry one at a time keeping the others in the fridge while the first one is baking.
For this recipe, there might be some overflow at the sides of the braid because there might be gaps in there like you see in the photos (see post); I don’t make perfect pastry braids and that’s okay. What you don’t want is to place too much filling in your pastry that it overflows everywhere which would result to a soggy not a crispy pastry.
This recipe yields 18 horizontal slices (like a biscotti) but can differ depending on you how you slice your pastry.
See the post for the complete step-by-step photos and tips on working with puff pastry.