Flaky Whole Grain Pop Tarts for Pockets

I’ve been getting a LOT of questions and requests for the homemade, whole-grain pop tarts you’ve been seeing pop up regularly on my Instagram feed recently. (Thanks! I’m so flattered!) And, at last, here’s the recipe…or a strong, trusty blueprint as it were.

So – pop tarts!

It used to be that a “pop tart” was a square little sweet made with scant amounts of fruit, lots of synthetic sweeteners encased in a cardboard-like-crust of flour stripped of its soul and nutrients, sprinkled with stabilizers so it could keep its shape for eternity inside a reflective wrapper. No more.

These pop tarts don’t have a wrapper, but do have lots of love + fresh fruit baked in an effing notable crust. And, you can make them anytime you want.

I wrote this recipe years back but lately have been tweaking it, making them more and more as a way of bringing some mindfulness into busy kitchen days, with an upgraded crust using the whole-grain, locally-grown-and-milled flours I’ve been buying from Moxie Bread. It’s a massive change for me and the pop tarts.

They’re the type of kitchen project that requires quiet, calm, space and a general chill attitude.

First, you make a dough, you let it rest, you shape it, measure it, let it rest, fill it, let it rest, bake it and FINALLY you have pop tarts. Unlike banana bread (that seems to come together even better in chaos) These require some space. Don’t let the work or the process deter you – it’s WORTH it. I promise.

The difference bag of flour from a grocery store shelf and one that was milled in a small mindful batch is huge. 

There are several reasons: conscience, taste, sustainability, and gluten-quality. These are differences you can taste, feel and see in the process of making the tarts, in the finished tarts and in your body when you eat them with joy. When you shift to using whole grains instead of generic “all-purpose flour,” you’ll taste the difference because different grains have different flavors.

When those flours have to fly across the country, they have to fly across the country they lose some of that flavor (just like freshly ground coffee does.)  Freshly ground coffee smells tantalizing, right, straight out of the grinder? Grains are the same, and the faster you can enjoy the flours they make the more incredible their flavor. Lastly, most bodies digest whole grains better than their over-processed counterparts. Bottom line: if you can, DO. My pastry-chef soul sings about it, and yours will too.

Now, the dough for these pop tarts is my standard whole-grain pie crust made unapologetically with 100% butter and I swap out flours depending on whatever I’m working with for the filling. I typically use at least two flours to make the crust – most recently einkorn and a wheat called “turkey red.” I could launch into a diatribe of different kinds of wheat, how the tastes are different depending on where they grow, etc. But know that both are whole grain, relatively high in protein as grains go, and their flavors go particularly well with stone fruits, and also brown sugar and cinnamon (which is one of my personal favorite pop tarts,) so that’s what I’ve written up in this recipe.

Let’s talk quickly about sourcing: your local grocery store is a great place to start.

Pick a small one that carries specialty products over a large one and don’t be afraid to ask questions about their selection of flours! Check your local farmers market too. If these ideas sound like a pain and you want exceptional flours delivered to your door, these spots are my favorites: Anson Mills, Bluebird Grain Farms and Hayden Flour Mills all grown and mill grain in the Rocky Mountain/West Coast regions. If you’re in Colorado, of course, I suggest getting to Moxie.

Even if you can’t find einkorn or a winter wheat, I would suggest swapping in quinoa, spelt, oat or another whole grain flour that you love or that piques your interest. Pick something nutty!

One last thing: in the recipe below I give you three different filling recipes for your tarts; a fresh-fruit option, a jam option and a lovely, simple cinnamon-brown sugar option. The fresh fruit option is basically making your own jam and I would suggest this once you get the hang (and the sense) for how long making pop tarts takes in your kitchen. The jam option is an amazing way to use favorite jam, and the cinnamon-brown sugar is just heavenly (and FAST.)

Once you’ve picked a flour, you’re ready to make the dough which is the trickiest but the easiest-to-learn element of making pop tarts – I promise. With practice, and by strictly following the tips below, it takes just 45-mins to an hour or so of prep time (I split this between days, to be honest) to have flaky pop tarts in your pockets. Make some space for the process, take your time and enjoy!

Be sure to check out my other recipe notes listed below for all the must-know info to master the art of making dough for these pocket-friendly pop tarts!