Portuguese Pastel de Santa Clara Recipe

Pastel de Santa Clara is a custard filled pastry from Portugal. The dough is simple, made using water, butter and flour. The custard filling is made using eggs, sugar and almonds. The dough is cut into circles and filled with a spoon of the cooled custard, folded then baked. It is served, sprinkled with powdered sugar.

Pastel de Santa Clara can have different shapes but its most common appearance looks like a small ball inside of a paper-thin shell made from dough that resembles a dainty flower.

Very similar to Pastel de Santa Clara is another well-known Portuguese pastry, pastel de nata. The key difference between the two, is that pastel de nata has a lighter or flaky pastry and pastel de Santa Clara filling contains almonds.

Origin & Cultural Significance

Pastel de Santa Clara is believed to have originated from a monastery in Santa Clara, Portugal where the nuns sold the pastries to students from the nearby university where their popularity exploded.

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Pastel de Santa Clara

Yield: 24 Servings

Prep Time: 30 minutes

Cook Time: 25 minutes

Total Time: 55 minutes

Pastel de Santa Clara is a custard filled pastry from Portugal. The dough is simple, made using water, butter and flour. The custard filling is made using eggs, sugar and almonds.

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Ingredients

• Wheat flour - 2 cups
• Margarine - 1/2 cup
• Ice water - 9 tbsp
• Sugar - 1 cup
• Water - 1 ½ cup
• Egg yolks - 9
• Almonds (toasted, ground) - 150g
• Powdered sugar

Instructions

1. In a pot, place the sugar and water and boil until a syrup forms, do not stir.
2. Turn off the heat and add the egg yolks stirring vigorously.
3. Return to the heat and keep stirring until it boils again.
4. Turn off the heat and add the almonds.
5. Let it to cool completely before using.
6. When the filling is cold, prepare the dough.
7. In a bowl combine the flour, margarine and ice water and mix.
8. Knead into a dough.
9. Roll the dough and cut out some paper-thin circles and some thicker circles.
10. Line the thin circles into small pie tins or muffin pans.
11. Spoon in the filling.
12. Cover with a disc of thicker dough and bake in a preheated oven at 250 degrees for 15 minutes.
13. When serving, unmold and sprinkle with powdered sugar.

Nutrition Information:

Yield: 24 Serving Size: 1
Amount Per Serving: Calories: 181Total Fat: 9gSaturated Fat: 2gTrans Fat: 1gUnsaturated Fat: 7gCholesterol: 69mgSodium: 35mgCarbohydrates: 23gFiber: 1gSugar: 14gProtein: 3g

Nutrition is provided and calculated by Nutritionix. It is for general information purposes and is only a rough estimation.