Pastelitos de guayaba

Ingredients

The pastry

• 2 sheetspuff pastry
• all butter if you can
• flour, to dust

The filling

• 300 gguava paste
• cut in slabs
• 200 gcream cheese
• or queso blanco

To finish

• 1egg, beaten
• for glazing
• 3 tablespoonssugar
• 3 tablespoonswater
• for the syrup glaze

To serve

• warm or cool
• with strong Cuban coffee

Directions

1. Salt cuts through sweetness sharply. Butter between layers makes steam. Puff pastry needs a genuinely hot oven. Keep the pastry cold until it goes in. Warm pastry does not puff properly. Cut the guava paste into slabs. Cut them about half a centimetre thick. Half a centimetre is about right.
2. Cut the cream cheese into slabs. Roll the pastry out on a floured surface. Roll it out only very lightly. Ready-made pastry is already thin enough.
3. Cut it into even sized rectangles. Cut the sheets into equal pieces. You need two of them per pastry. Keep every one of them the same size. Lay half the rectangles on a lined tray. Set a slab of guava on each one. Set a slab of the cheese on that.
4. Keep the filling well inside the edges. Leave a clear border all round. Brush the border with beaten egg. Lay a second rectangle on top. Press the edges together firmly. Press the edges properly closed. Press the edges down with a fork. Press it firmly all the way round. Cut one small slit in each top.
5. Steam builds up as the filling melts. One small slit in it is enough. Brush the tops with beaten egg. Egg gives a deep golden shine. Brush the glaze on thinly and evenly. That stops them rising properly. Heat the oven to two hundred degrees.
6. Bake them for about twenty minutes. Puff pastry needs a genuinely hot oven. Preheat it fully before they go in. Judging them takes a careful look. Warm the sugar and water together. Stir until the sugar dissolves. It should be a fairly thin syrup. Brush the syrup over the hot pastries.
7. Brush them straight from the oven. Hot pastry absorbs all the syrup. Cool pastry just goes very sticky. Let them all cool on a wire rack. The filling is extremely hot at first. Wait a while before biting into one. Serving them is done warm or cool. Serve strong Cuban coffee alongside. The two go together at any hour.

Technique

• Puff pastry needs a genuinely hot oven, since the butter between the layers must turn to steam fast enough to push them apart — a cool oven melts it out instead and gives flat greasy pastry. Keep everything cold until it goes in and refrigerate the assembled pastries twenty minutes first, which makes a real difference.
• Egg glaze goes on before baking and the sugar syrup after: syrup before baking simply burns. Brush the syrup on straight from the oven, since hot pastry absorbs it and dries to a shine while cool pastry just goes sticky.
• Melted guava paste is almost entirely sugar, holds heat badly and stays hot after the pastry has cooled, so give them ten minutes before biting in — hot sugar burns are genuinely nasty.

Substitutions

• Queso blanco is the traditional cheese and holds its shape better; cream cheese is the common modern choice and melts more smoothly.
• Cut the guava paste about half a centimetre thick — thicker slabs run out as they melt and thinner ones disappear entirely.

Variations

• The atlas also carries pan con timba, the same guava-and-cheese pairing assembled in bread rather than baked in pastry; the sweet paste and salty cheese balance each other exactly.
• Avoid letting egg glaze run down the cut edges, since egg there seals the layers together and stops them rising.
• Cuban bakeries across the diaspora, particularly in Miami, keep these as a fixture, and they carry a strong association with home — which the atlas records rather than omitting.

History

Flaky puff pastries filled with guava paste and cheese, a bakery staple of Havana and of Cuban exile communities abroad.

Frequently asked questions

What is Pastelitos de guayaba?

Pastelitos de guayaba is a bread & pastry from Cuba: flaky puff pastries with guava and cream cheese. Flaky puff pastries filled with guava paste and cheese, a bakery staple of Havana and of Cuban exile communities abroad.

How long does Pastelitos de guayaba take to make?

Pastelitos de guayaba takes 30 minutes of preparation and 25 minutes of cooking. The recipe makes about 12 pastries. It is rated easy to make.

What can I substitute in Pastelitos de guayaba?

Yes, within limits. Queso blanco is the traditional cheese and holds its shape better; cream cheese is the common modern choice and melts more smoothly. Cut the guava paste about half a centimetre thick — thicker slabs run out as they melt and thinner ones disappear entirely.

What is the most important thing to get right in Pastelitos de guayaba?

Puff pastry needs a genuinely hot oven, since the butter between the layers must turn to steam fast enough to push them apart — a cool oven melts it out instead and gives flat greasy pastry. Keep everything cold until it goes in and refrigerate the assembled pastries twenty minutes first, which makes a real difference.