Viral upside-down puff pastry squares are an easy sweet or savory recipe for an elegant dish
Upside-down puff pastry squares that look as easy to make as they are delicious to eat have reached viral status on food TikTok for good reason.
There's something inherently elegant and special when layers of laminated dough bake up to light, flakey layers of buttery golden perfection.
Puff pastry, or pâte feuilletée, is the base for many delicious confections, such as tarte Tatin -- a French dessert baked upside down to achieve perfectly caramelized apples with a flaky pastry crust. It's also used in a multitude of savory applications from vegetable galettes to simple cheese straws.
This idea from recipe developer, blogger, and content creator Lily Ghodrati marries the best of both worlds with ease to replicate at home. For six years, Ghodrati told "Good Morning America," she's been passionately innovating in the kitchen -- but her "speciality on TikTok is definitely creating quick, easy and creative food hacks."
Scroll below to check out how she makes her now-viral upside-down puff pastries, and be sure to try them yourself.
Upside-down Sheet Tray Puff Pastry Squares
Ghodrati's caramelized nectarine and honey pastries, which are made on a single sheet tray and cook in less than 20 minutes, have garnered more than 42.5 million views on TikTok, prompting hundreds of home cooks to try their hand at the concept.
Like many past trending recipes, the use of minimal ingredients that can be swapped out based on individual flavor preferences is a perfect template for viral success.
The individual squares made with just three ingredients were borne of Ghodrati's thoughts while browsing for a tarte Tatin recipe -- specifically "how it was constructed and the process of making it," she said.
"As I'm all for making things as quick and easy as possible, the idea to simplify it popped into my head. A similar process could be done all on a baking tray and you could make individual smaller servings, which would also speed up the process," she told "Good Morning America."
"Instead of using sugar and butter, you could use honey which would caramelize and sweeten the fruit at the same time," she explained. "The choice of fruit used could be versatile, but I recommend using fruit that is firm and not fully ripe yet, since it holds its shape better."
Plus, she said, "an advantage of laying the fruit down first and placing the puff pastry on top, is it prevents the pastry from becoming soggy. So you end up with a well-cooked flaky pastry while the fruit gets caramelized on the bottom just like a Tarte Tatin."
After the sweet treat became "a big hit," Ghodrati "decided to do a savory version."
"As Shallot Tarte Tatin is quite popular and delicious, I thought I would hero it in this savory version," she said. "I am a big fan of caramelized onion, especially when flavored with balsamic vinegar. So I chose the base to be a mixture of olive oil, balsamic glaze and maple syrup for that perfect balance of sweet, savory and tangy."
She also added thyme, which she said "goes hand in hand" with the other flavors and results in "a delicious light and flavourful pastry."
This is not Ghodrati's first time topping the viral food charts. Her other recipes that became worldwide trends include "accordion potatoes, parmesan crusted potatoes, tortilla cones and peach donuts," she said -- all of which can be found on her TikTok page.
