Napoleon-Style Kefir Puff Pastries
An unexpected result from simple homemade puff pastries. This pastry has a cottage-cheese-like aroma, even though there is no cottage cheese in the dough at all. The pastries are very crisp and practically melt in your mouth. From a minimal list of ingredients, you can make wonderful flaky cookies for tea.
Updated : 22 April, 2026
Easy
More than 1 hour.
Ingredients
Batter
250 grams
Butter
250 milliliters
Kefir
10 grams
Baking powder
550 grams
Wheat flour
to taste
Salt
Crumble
150 grams
Butter
120 grams
Wheat flour
150 grams
Sugar
10 grams
Vanilla sugar
Decorating
20 grams
Powdered sugar
Table
Table of volume measurements:
- teaspoon - 5 ml
- dessert spoon - 10 ml
- tablespoon - 20 ml
- glass - 200 ml
Preparation
Step 1
Start by making the dough. Prepare all the necessary ingredients. Use all-purpose flour. From the total amount, set aside about 50 g (about 1.8 oz) of flour, you will need it later when rolling out the dough. The richer the kefir, the tastier the pastries will be. The butter must be cold, so take it out of the refrigerator right before you begin.
Step 2
Take a wide bowl in which it will be convenient to grate the butter and knead the dough. Sift the flour into the bowl. Add the salt and baking powder and mix them with the flour so they are evenly distributed. The flour needs to be sifted so the dough is aerated and becomes lighter. Grate the butter into the same bowl on a coarse grater. To make the butter easier to grate and to keep it from sticking too much to the grater, dip it in flour.
Step 3
Mix everything thoroughly and rub it into crumbs.
Step 4
Add the kefir to the crumbs, mix well, and knead the dough.
Step 5
There is no need to knead the dough for a long time. Gather it into a ball. The grater and the dish you used for the dough will be needed later for making the crumb mixture. The dough should not be too soft or runny. If there is not enough flour, add a little. Even flour of the same type can vary from one manufacturer to another, so the amount of flour given in the recipe may be either too little or too much.
Step 6
Wrap the dough in plastic wrap or a clean bag and place it in the refrigerator for 1-1 1/2 hours, the longer the better. The thinner the sheet of dough, the faster it will chill.
Step 7
Now make the crumb mixture. Prepare all the necessary ingredients from the list. Use all-purpose flour. If you plan to use vanilla extract instead of vanilla sugar, reduce the amount by ten times. If you add too much vanilla, you may spoil the flavor of the finished pastry. The butter must be cold.
Step 8
Sift the flour into a bowl and mix it with the sugar and vanilla. As in Step 2, grate in the butter.
Step 9
Rub everything into even crumbs. Put the crumb mixture into the refrigerator. It also needs to chill.
Step 10
Chilled dough is very easy to work with. Knead it slightly after taking it out of the refrigerator so it becomes more even. Divide it into 6 equal parts. If it is hard for you to judge by eye, use a kitchen scale. Turn the oven on to preheat to 180°C (350°F).
Step 11
Dust the work surface with flour and roll out the first piece of dough thinly into a rectangular sheet. The edges do not have to be perfectly even. To make the dough easier to handle, dust the rolling pin and your hands with flour. While you are rolling out the dough, return the remaining pieces to the refrigerator so the butter does not melt and the pastry-making process is not disrupted.
Step 12
For baking, take the largest baking tray that fits into your oven. Dust it lightly with flour or line it with parchment paper. Transfer the first layer onto the tray. Thinly rolled dough is easy to move with the help of a rolling pin. Loosely roll the dough around the pin, transfer it, and unroll it in the needed spot.
Step 13
Take the crumb mixture out of the refrigerator and divide it into 5 equal parts. Use one part of the crumbs to cover the rolled-out dough evenly. Repeat the same process with 4 more pieces of dough, covering each new layer with crumbs.
Step 14
When rolling out the last piece of dough, make it slightly larger than all the previous ones. Cover the whole layered stack with it so that it also covers the edges. Tuck the edges under the bottom layer and even out the sides.
Step 15
Using a sharp knife, cut the layered stack into pieces and move them apart so the edges do not touch and stick together during baking. Choose the size as you wish, I cut mine into 24 pieces, each about 4 x 3 cm (about 1.6 x 1.2 inches). If you want larger pastries, make fewer portions. Bake on the middle rack of the oven at 180°C (350°F) for 35-40 minutes. Depending on the characteristics of your oven, the time may vary.
Author note
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