Apricot napoleon with almond praline

Frozen pastry is a handy option for impressive desserts. I prefer to buy the frozen flat sheets as then you don’t have to worry about rolling out the pastry. With puff or flaky pastry I will sometimes use two layers of puff pastry sandwiched together to give a more substantial result.

Ingredients

4 sheets	Flaky puff pastry, frozen
1 cup	Water
1 cup	Sugar
½	Oranges, juiced
150 g	Dried apricots, sliced
1 cup	Mascarpone
1 cup	Cream, whipped

Directions

1. Heat the oven to 220C and leave pastry sheets to defrost for 10 minutes.
2. Place 2 sheets of pastry on the bench and put add another sheet of pastry to the top of each one so you end up with two sets of 2-layered pastry. This gives a more substantial result.
3. With a sharp knife, cut the pastry into rectangles of approx 12x5cm. Place on a baking sheet lined with baking paper and prick with a fork.
4. Bake for 10 minutes or until golden then place on cake rack to cool.
5. For the sugar syrup, place water and sugar in a pot and bring to the boil. Simmer for 30 minutes or to 120C, or soft ball stage (this is when you drop a teaspoon of the sugar into a cup of cold water, it forms a soft glue that you can roll into a ball).
6. Remove from the heat. Add the orange juice and the sliced apricots and leave to cool.
7. Whip the cream until firm and stir through the mascarpone. With a metal spoon stir through the apricot and sugar syrup.
8. Place a pastry wafer in the centre of a plate. Add a layer of the apricot cream.
9. Place a second pastry wafer on top and add more cream. Finish with a third pastry wafer.
10. Garnish with almond praline(see how to make praline here)and a dusting of icing sugar.