These delightfully sweet puff pastry lemon rolls are flaky and delicious. They are surprisingly easy to make and work great as a breakfast treat or a yummy dessert.
Sweet Puff Pastry Lemon Rolls
Yep, it’s winter but oh what happy joy for those of us in Southern California because the lemons are ripe and ready to be picked! We have boxes of Meyers Lemons from our trees in the Sweetie Pie and Cupcakes Garden 🙂 and aside from my better half making his amazing homemade Margaritas, we are baking up everything lemon over here, including these amazing sweet puff pastry lemon rolls!
We use homemade puff pastry but you can easily use store bought puff pastry found in the freezer section of most grocery stores. Just thaw out the puff pastry before laying it out. If you’ve never made puff pastry before and want to give it a try, click on over to the puff pastry recipe and take a look. It takes patience and love, but it’s actually quite simple if you are home and can fit it in to your tasks for the day. Puff pastry requires about 4 turns of the dough and this ensures that when you bake it, those lovely layers separate and puff apart 🙂
I will say that the sweet puff pastry lemon rolls are the perfect treat for tea with a friend, or as breakfast with the family, or as a dessert treat! They are like a lemon version of cinnamon rolls and if you are craving lemon, they will easily become your new jam! The puff pastry is buttery and flaky and the lemon curd inside is tart and sweet. The real treat is the tasty lemon icing drizzled on top!
Sweet Meyers Lemons
We are lucky enough to have a few mature Meyers Lemons trees in our backyard. I had no idea that there was a difference to lemons, but now after tasting and baking many different lemons, I can say I AM IN LOVE! Meyers lemons have a distinct taste to them and you will come to identify them simply by smelling the uncut lemon. They smell lovely and the juice and zest from these lemons makes our recipes that much better. You’ve heard me say it before, and I’ll say it again, ingredients matter! When you start treating yourself and your family to higher quality and organic ingredients, you will notice a difference, not only in the taste but also to food reactions, including allergies.
If you are going to bake these sweet puff pastry lemon rolls, I would encourage you to buy Meyers Lemons if you can find them. We often find them at Trader Joe’s when our lemon tree is out of season.
Lemon Zest
So everyone has their way of zesting a lemon. I just use the fine part of our cheese grater. You wouldn’t want to use something like a vegetable peeler because it would go too far down on the rind. You only want the yellow part of the lemon (the rind). When you hit the white part, stop. The white pith will taste too bitter in your recipes. A microplane is made especially for zesting lemons and it will shave off the rind leaving the pith behind. You should be able to get at least one teaspoon of zest from a medium lemon.
Lemon Juice
Once you have zested your lemon, you can cut it in half and juice it. My hubby taught me a handy trick where you hold a lemon half in one hand and use a fork to juice, twisting as you squeeze the lemon. This works equally well for limes as well. We use a lemon strainer to catch the seeds. If you have a tough lemon or lime, you can roll in on the counter with the palm of your hand. And you could also microwave it for a few seconds to warm it up. It should juice fine at room temperature though. There are wooden reamers made especially for juicing. They help to press the juice out. You should be able to juice up to 4 tablespoons of juice from one medium ripe lemon.
Lemon Curd
Lemon curd is so easy to make and if you have enough lemons, why not make it at home? You can buy it at the store in the jelly isle. The recipe below is simple and straightforward and makes more than enough lemon curd for this recipe plus a few more! You can add lemon curd into yogurt or top it on berries and fruit. It goes well in lemon bars and blends nicely into whipped cream or buttercream to frost cakes or cupcakes! Add it to french toast or pancakes. Make a graham cracker crust and top it with lemon curd to make a yummy lemon tart! The possibilities are endless!
Tips for Making Sweet Puff Pastry Lemon Rolls:
- If using frozen puff pastry, make sure to let it thaw out a bit before using it. If you made homemade puff pastry, you can refrigerate it for an hour and then roll it out to about a 14″ by 20″ rectangle.
- Smooth the lemon curd onto the pastry with a spoon.
- Roll up the pastry into a tight log.
- Use a serrated knife to cut the rolls. You can make marks on the roll to count out 12 rolls. Make sure to make the rolls about 3/4″ to 1″ thick.
- Place each roll onto the baking sheet lined with parchment paper.
- Bake up the lemon rolls for at least 20 minutes and then watch them closely. Remember to let them bake until you see a little golden brown forming around the edge. You can even poke them a bit to see if they are firming up. Just make sure that you give them enough time for the center to bake.
- Make and drizzle on the lemon icing when the rolls have been removed from the oven and cooled a bit. The drizzle will melt into the cracks of the lemon rolls. Yummm!
I know you will enjoy this lemony tart roll recipe. Lemons have a way of cheering you up so they are the perfect winter treat on cold dull days! Warm up a cup of tea and enjoy these sweet lemon roll treats!
Here’s the recipe for the Sweet Puff Pastry Lemon Rolls:
Sweet Puff Pastry Lemon Rolls
Ingredients
Method
- Heat oven to 375 degrees F. Lightly flour a work surface. Unwrap or roll out one puff pastry sheet.
- Spread 1/2 cup to one cup of lemon curd onto the pastry sheet.
- Starting from one of the long ends of the rectangular puff pastry sheet, roll into a tight log.
- Prepare a baking sheet with parchment paper. Use a serrated knife to slice the log into 12 rolls. Place the rolls onto the parchment paper. Bake for 20-30 minutes, watching the rolls carefully after about 20 minutes.
- They will start to turn a light golden brown around the edges. Wait until they are firm and a little golden to ensure that the puff pastry cooks on the inside.
- Juice and zest a lemon and combine with the powdered sugar in a bowl. Drizzle the lemon icing onto the hot rolls with a spoon.
- Sprinkle each roll with lemon zest and feel free to also add sliced almonds. Enjoy!
- Zest a lemon and set zest aside.
- Juice a lemon in a separate bowl and set aside.
- Cream together the sugar, lemon zest and butter. Beat in the eggs. Then add the lemon juice and salt. Place in a sauce pan and heat on low for 5-10 minutes until the mixture thickens.
- Remove from heat and when cool, use in recipe or store in a jar in the fridge.
Notes
Tried this recipe?
Let us know how it was!
I used Bonne Maman lemon curd and Pepperidge Farms puff pastry and these did not come out well for me. There was no way to get more than 1/2c onto the pastry because when rolled, it just completely oozed everywhere, wasting a ton. I tried a second batch using closer to 1/3-1/2c and there was less waste but still not a great product. The biggest issue by far was that the cues that oozed out in the oven started burning at about 9min in…. there was nothing to be done bc the pastry hadn’t even begun to rise, let alone cook, so I was left with puffs with completely burned (sugar) bottoms.
Have you made this recipe with both storebought ingredients? Your instructions seem like they would work better with your homemade ingredients, but since the recipe indicated I could use the storebought, that’s what I tried (I was in a hurry).
I’m thinking a lower cooking temp might help with the burning, but there was a huge difference in the viscosity of the store bought curd and what your pics indicate.
Kristina, thanks for sharing your experience with store bought puff pastry. I haven’t tried the Pepperidge Farm Puff Pastry. I usually make puff pastry from scratch because I can control the ingredients (not a fan of preservatives). I do know when I bake with pastries and pie crust, the temperature can make a huge difference. It may have needed to be chilled in the freezer for a half hour to an hour first. Also, for the lemon curd, the consistency could play a huge roll. The baking time and temp for the puff pastry would probably need to be adjusted to what the Pepperidge Farms packaging represents as well. I appreciate you sharing for those who might be baking it with store bought ingredients!
I made these using my own curd recipe and had the same result of oozing out and burning,,, so,,, I then made it with YOUR curd recipe ! What a difference ! I love how simple and delicious your recipe is ! They came out beautiful and I am making them again to gift to a lemon loving friend .
Yay! I’m so glad it helped! Enjoy!