Make these adorable Vegan Love Letter Pastries for your someone special this Valentines day. These mini hand pies are folded like an envelope, with a homemade buttery pastry, filled with delicious strawberry jam, and sealed with a heart. They’re fun, easy to make and sure to impress!
Vegan Love Letter Hand Pastries
It’s the season of love, and what better way to show someone how much you love them than with a love letter. Make it even better and make it a delicious, sweet, flakey, buttery and ‘melt in your mouth’ edible love letter with a jam filling – yum yum!!
I’ve been so excited to share these sweet and delicious love letter pastries with you, ever since I posted my Vegan Strawberry Danish recipe which blew up on Tiktok. There’s something romantic about strawberries for Valentines day. I don’t know whether it’s their gorgeous pink colour, or juicy & sweet flavour, but it simply hit’s the spot!
Why you’ll love this recipe:
- Vegan
- Super easy to make
- Delicious
- Melt in the mouth pastry
- Easy to find / simple ingredients
- Can be made gluten-free by swapping to a GF flour blend
- Fun to make
- Great for Valentines Day, Mothers Day or even tea parties
- They make great party food
- One ingredient filling
- Tasty snack
- It’s a great way to use up any left over jam
Ingredients you’ll need to make these love letter pastries
I wanted to make this recipe as simple, quick and easy as possible, so I used my go-to shortcrust pastry which is only 4 ingredients, along with a 1 ingredient filling and a sugar dusting. They couldn’t be easier to make!
Plain flour
- As we don’t need the pastry to rise unlike cake or cupcakes, plain flour is great! You can make this recipe gluten-free by using a gluten-free plain flour blend. I recommend Doves Farm.
Caster sugar
- Fine caster sugar adds sweetness, and also helps to bind the pastry. To help the pastry turn golden and have a delicious crisp top, you can sprinkle over some sugar before baking.
Dairy-free block butter
- Cold butter directly from the fridge helps to create the perfect, buttery pastry. My favourite vegan butters are Naturli Vegan Block and Flora Plant Block Alternative.
Ice-water
- To make ice-water, pour water in a bowl and add in a few ice cubes. Stir, and allow to fit for a few minutes so the water turns really cold. now the water is perfect to use in the pastry. Using ice water helps to keep the fat cold so it does not melt. If the fat ends up melting before the pastry is baked, it’s absorbed into the flour and wont produce a flakey pastry.
Strawberry jam
- You can use store bought like me to make things easier, or make your own homemade jam / compote. I have the most amazing jam recipe in my book.
Dairy-free milk
- Brush some milk over the pastry before baking, this will help attach the sprinkled sugar and also helps with the golden colour.
Icing sugar
- Serve the pastries with a dusting of icing sugar. Simply sprinkle icing sugar / powdered sugar over the pastries before serving. It adds sweetness and a gorgeous effect.
How to assemble a love letter pastry
These pastries look technical and like they would be hard to make, but they are SUPER quick and easy! You simple need to know how to fold them and then you’re ready to go. You’ll be making dozens of these hand pies in minutes – haha! They’re also great for kids to get involved in making.
- Roll out the pastry
First step is to roll out the pastry in between two sheets of grease proof paper, which have been lightly floured. As the dough is similar to shortcrust, the main ingredient is butter so it has a tendency to stick. Roll out the dough until pretty thin, but not too thin.
- Cutting the dough
You want to use a sharp knife to cut the dough. Make sure it is sharp as you don’t want to pull on the tough tearing it. Cut a diamond shape (10cm each side). Lift up the shape and place onto a grease proof paper lined baking tray. I like to fill and shape the pastries on the baking tray as this just makes it easier.
- Pastry hearts
Make sure to leave a little pastry behind. You want to roll this in the same way we did for the diamond shapes, but use a mini heart cookie cutter to chomp out the heart shapes.
- Jam filling
You can either pipe the jam into the middle of the pastries using a piping bag with the tip snipped off, or simple use a small spoon.
- Forming the love letter
To create the love letter shape, following the folds of a real envelope, fold in the left, right, and bottom flaps over the strawberry jam, leaving the upper flap open. Brush milk over the pastry and on the back of the pastry heart and stick into the middle of the envelope. Sprinkle over sugar, bake and serve.
Looking for more Valentines recipes, check these out:
No-bake Peanut Butter hearts (vegan)
Classic Vegan Air Fryer Doughnuts
Easy Vegan Strawberry Danishes
Flourless Chocolate cake (vegan)
Gluten-free Vegan Strawberry Cake
If you make, and love this recipe, please leave a ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ rating below. Thank you & happy baking! Make sure to tag me in your photos on Instagram and Facebook! And if you want to pin this recipe for later, you can use the button on the recipe card, above or below this post, or on any of the photos. Happy baking all!
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Vegan Love Letter Pastries
- Total Time: 45 minutes
- Yield: Approx 10 1x
- Diet: Vegan
Description
Show someone you love them with these delicious and moreish Vegan Love Letter Pastries, with a homemade 4 ingredient pastry and strawberry jam filling. Utterly delicious!
Ingredients
Ingredients
- 240g of plain flour
- 2 tablespoons of caster sugar (plus extra for sprinkling)
- 220g of dairy-free block butter (cold and cut into small cubes)
- Ice-water (see method)
- 1 jar of vegan friendly strawberry jam
- Dairy-free milk (optional)
- Icing sugar (dusting, optional)
Instructions
Method
- In a medium sized mixing bowl, sift together the flour and sugar. Add in the cold / cubed butter and mix until it resembles sand. You can mix by hand or in a food processor.
- Add in the ice water 1/2 tablespoon at a time until the dough comes together. It may require 1-2 tablespoons of ice-water. You want the dough to be smooth and slightly sticky, but not too dry or wet.
- Wrap the dough in some grease proof paper and place into the fridge for 30 minutes or until it feels firm. This will help to prevent sticking when you roll it out.
- Preheat oven to 170°C fan and line 2 baking trays with grease proof paper.
- Lay a sheet of grease proof paper on your worktop and dust with some flour.
- Roll out the dough in-between 2 sheets of floured grease proof paper until its a large rectangle. Use a sharp knife to cut the dough into a diamond shape (approximately 10cm on each side). Place on the lined trays. Repeat until you’ve used up almost all the dough. Use a mini heart shaped cookie cutter to use out shapes with the remaining dough.
- Spoon a teaspoon or two of strawberry jam into the middle of the diamond shapes. Fold three of the corners into the centre (sides and bottom) so that the pastry looks like an open envelope. Press the corners in to seal the jam in (refer the images above for examples).
- Brush the pastry with some dairy-free milk and stick on the hearts into the center (see photos for reference). Sprinkle over some sugar, this will help give the pastry a golden colour and will also make it crispy on top.
- Bake the pastries in the middle of the oven for 20-25 minutes, or until the pastry is golden brown in colour.
- Once baked, remove from the oven and allow to cool. The pastry will be a little soft when first out of the oven, but will crisp up beautifully.
- Serve with a sprinkling of icing sugar. You could even add a drizzle of a simple glaze on top, but I personally think they’re perfect without it.
Notes
To store: Keep the pastries stored in the fridge, allow to come to room temperature before enjoying. Best eaten on day of making or within 2 days of making.
Ice water : Fill a small bowl 1/4 full with tap water, then add in a few ice cubes. Allow this to sit for a few minutes then use.
- Prep Time: 15 minutes
- Cook Time: 20-25 minutes
- Category: Pastry
- Method: Baking
- Cuisine: American
how do you make the dough please 🥺
Author
The recipe to the pastry is in the recipe card, bottom of this post! xxx
Can you use store bought dough? I’m not vegan so I’m pretty much going to use all of the normal products and just want to know if store bought would also work?
Yes, you can use store bought dough sheets. I did and came out perfectly.
Author
Ohhhh i love hearing this! Im definitely going to try with puff pastry myself now- yum ahah! x
Thank you! They seem very easy to make and your own dough recipe is very easy! Yum!!
Me encanto, perfecto para regalo de cumpleaños ☺️
Very interesting with your lovely idea, I will try it, thank you
Making these for work! These were super easy! However the places of connection baked funny so the places where the dish meets no longer meets. 🥺
Author
Hello, YAY! so happy you enjoyed! I mine weren’t perfect either but i think thats the charm, use some milk to help the pastry stick! This will help a ton xx
Can you freeze these and defrost for later?
Author
Hello, It would be best to freeze the dough (wrap it up and pop in the freezer), then allow it to thaw in the fridge overnight and use the following day! That always works the best with this pastry! xx
What size heart cutter did you use? The link you attached has 3 included. Trying to find something similar in US Amazon. Thank you.
Can you eat this after 2 days of making or do you have to throw them away? I’m storing them in the fridge if that makes a difference.