Easy Sticky Buns with Apple and Almond

I love a good sticky bun, like most people do. What I don’t love is making them. They aren’t terribly complicated but they do take a lot of time to prepare. It’s mostly just waiting for dough to rise to continue to the next step. I wanted to figure out a way to make sticky buns easy, delicious and with some fall fruit. After playing around with some ideas, I think I came up with something that will be great for casual weekend breakfasts in your pajamas!

How to make sticky buns easy.

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The shortcut I take here is store bought puff pastry. One of the greatest baking inventions of all time! I’ve made puff pastry once in my life and that was in culinary school. Frozen puff pastry is readily available. Pepperidge Farms makes one that is found in most everyday grocery stores. The holy grail of puff pastry is all butter Dufour, which I’ve found at Whole Foods. It’s great but pretty pricey. Trader Joe’s makes a nice all butter puff pastry but it’s only available in late fall and winter.

Since I’m using puff pastry here and not a yeast risen dough, you won’t get the super soft middle in a traditional cinnamon bun. What you do get is a crispy, flaky exterior and layers that pull apart on the inside. The brown sugar and butter that tops each bun forms a caramel that is so good! Don’t dismiss the extra that spills over the top of each muffin cup. Pull it off while still warm and set it aside for yourself as a little sweet nibble.

These buns are customizable!

These sticky buns are very flexible. If you don’t want apple, you could substitute pears or another similar fruit. If you are a raisin, current or cranberry lover, feel free to add these too! Cinnamon could be swapped out for cardamom (just use less). Any type of nut could be used instead of almonds. Pear and walnut sounds great. So does pecan and white raisin. Just keep the filling amount the same. You could even leave the fruit out of the bun completely.

As I was testing these, I found that sometimes the end of the roll would come unstuck during baking. Brushing the pastry dough at the end of the roll with butter helped to prevent this. Another tip if this happens: as the buns come out of the oven, take the tip of a butter knife or small offset spatula and push the ends back into the muffin cup. They will stick right back onto the bun and the cooling caramel will make it cohesive again.

This apple and almond sticky bun recipe is so easy. The hardest part is remembering to thaw out puff pastry dough and leaving butter out to soften. Other than that, you could easily knock these up in the same amount of time it takes to make homemade waffles or pancakes. It’s also a great one to have the kids pitch in and help make!

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