I think we’ve all been there. You have all these fanciful daydreams of making impressively difficult French desserts full of precise slight of hand techniques that wouldn’t just make us kitchen magicians if we pulled them off but freaking wizards. Maybe we’d watch a video or two on how to make your puff pastry puff just so and your creamy filling creamy and yet sturdy enough to build towers of literally sweet victory*. You block off a day to do it, preheat your oven, whip your filling just right and then you go to grab your package of defrosted puff pastry and find it’s not what you thought.

Sacrebleu! You defrosted the puff pastry cups you bought to veganize Betty Crocker’s mini chicken pot pies and not the sheets you had bought to make the proper napoleons. You might freak out for a second and have to remind yourself that in the big spectrum of world problems this would be considered a fortunate accident. See napoleons by definition require multiple layers of puff pastry that’s why in France these types of desserts are usually called mille-feuilles which means thousand leaves. But these bitty cups only allow for one (kinda) layer – thus not a real napoleon.

But these cups are still an adorable napoleon-ish holiday treat that features a vegan holiday tradition – dare I say INSTITUTION –  in what we hope is a new and interesting way. See even if you’ve been vegan for awhile, you might remember the first time you spotted soy nog sitting quietly in your grocery store dairy case and it was like spotting a robot unicorn. It was both curious and magical while also being possible and impossible all at once. This was before pumpkin spice soy milk marked the beginning of autumn and when chocolate soy milk had just started to become pretty common place. Some of us wouldn’t feel like it was Christmas season until we got our first carton of the stuff and by some of us – I mean me. Now if you’ve been reading our blog for awhile you know we make a nog-related recipe every year. We’ve made cupcakes and cheesecake. We even had a white chocolate coconut nog truffle recipe in our newsletter last year that was pretty craze-balls. This year we went napoleon cups!

Now we used Silk Holiday Soy Nog for this recipe and didn’t try it with any of the numerous coconut or almond nogs available now. If you decide to try it with those please let us know how it turns out! We’d love to hear about it!

Soy Nog Napoleon Cups

Filling

1/3 cup sugar

3 tablespoons cornstarch

3 tablespoons powdered sugar

2 pinches sea salt

2 cups vegan soy egg nog, we recommend using Silk Holiday Soy Nog

1 tablespoon ener-g egg replacer

1 tablespoon ground golden flaxseed

1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

1/4 teaspoon nutmeg

1 vanilla bean, split and scraped – optional

2 tablespoons margarine

2 teaspoons rum extract or rum

Cups

1 package 6 vegan puff pastry cups

1 cup vegan whipped cream, we recommend using pre-made or using the recipe on page of Betty Goes Vegan

6 cinnamon sticks

Cinnamon to sprinkle over each cup

If you are making your own vegan whipped cream you’re going to want to chill your coconut milk overnight, while also defrosting your puff pastry following the directions on the package. The day you want to serve your napoleon cups, start by making your filling.

In a saucepan, mix sugar, cornstarch, powdered sugar, salt, egg replacer, flaxseed, cinnamon, nutmeg and the inside scraped from your vanilla bean until blended. Whisk the sugar mix while pouring in your soy nog and heating the saucepan at a medium heat. Whisk constantly to get out any clumps that might form. The mix will start to thicken as it boils. Start to stir with a large spoon. Boil and stir for about a minute.

Remove from heat and mix in margarine, rum extract. If you decide to use rum instead of rum extract, you should know it has a stronger flavor in my opinion and so you might want to add a little at a time and test it to see when you feel like you’ve added enough.

Pour your filling into a large bowl and cover the bowl with plastic wrap. Put in the fridge about an hour or until chilled.

While your filling is chilling**, prepare your puff pastry cups following the directions on the package and then cool on a wire rack to room temperature before filling. If you’re making your own whipped cream, I’d make that now. Don’t forget to remove the puff pastry caps on the cups at this point too.

Once your puff pastry cups are baked and cooled, fill a frosting gun with your soy nog filling. Using the largest tip, fill your cups until they are slightly overflowing. Put the little puff pastry cap on top and then add a dollop of vegan whipped cream. Gently balance your cinnamon stick on top and sprinkle some cinnamon over that.

Serve slightly chilled with holiday cheer in your heart.

* Huzzah! 

**WHA? I didn’t even plan that!