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Strawberry Cream Cheese Kolacky are indulgent pastries, perfect for your dessert table. These delightful cookies, filled with a rich blend of cheesecake and strawberry jam, are ideal for various occasions such as holidays, baby showers, wedding showers, and birthdays, adding a touch of sweetness to each celebration.
Soft, flaky, and delicious pastries filled with a sweet cream cheese mixture and strawberry jam. Also known as Kolacky, these pastries are made with a rich, buttery dough that is infused with cream cheese, giving them a tangy and creamy flavor that pairs perfectly with the sweet and fruity filling.
Ingredients For Kolacky
- 2 packages (16-ounces) cream cheese, softened
- 2 sticks unsalted butter, softened (16 tablespoons or 226 grams)
- 2 cups all-purpose flour
- 1/2 cup powdered sugar plus more for dusting
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
- strawberry jam
How To Make Strawberry Cream Cheese Kolacky
- Make the dough: In your mixer’s bowl, beat the cream cheese and butter until smooth and fluffy. Add in the flour and salt and continue to mix until combined.
- Lightly dust your work area with powdered sugar. Transfer the dough to the work area and shape it into a ball. Divide it into 4 rounds; flatten each round and cover it with plastic wrap. Refrigerate for 30 minutes.
- Prepare the creamy filling: In the meantime, prepare the filling by combining the cream cheese, powdered sugar, and vanilla in a mixer’s bowl. Beat until creamy and smooth.
- Dust the work area with flour. Remove the dough from the fridge and let it rest for 5 minutes. Roll out each ball of dough to a 1/4-inch thickness and cut it into 3×3 squares.
- Fill the center of each square with cream cheese mixture and strawberry jam. For a prettier presentation, using a pastry bag, you can pipe the fillings, one over the other.
- Overlap opposite corners of the dough to the center and over the filling. Pinch the seams together. Refrigerate for 1 hour.
- Preheat oven to 375˚F. Bake the cookies for 10 to 11 minutes or until the edges are browned.
- Cool completely and serve.
Recipe Tips And Variations
- Sensitive Dough: I’m always a little hesitant about sharing these from-back-home recipes with you because some of them require a little bit of kitchen skill. Just a little. For instance, this dough. It’s amazing, but it’s also a diva. If you don’t chill it, it will fall apart. Also!?! Using too much filling will make the cookies soggy.
- Freeze the Dough: Keep in mind that you can make the dough hours ahead of time or freeze it! Then all that’s left to do is thaw it out, roll the dough, cut it into small squares, and arrange the filling in the center of the squares. And bake, of course.
- Sweet Filling: Also, you don’t have to use my strawberry cheesecake filling. Popular fillings for kolache are peach jam, apricot, raspberry, and strawberry or cherry preserves.
- Storing: Do not leave these on the kitchen counter. One, because they will disappear in seconds, and two, because, again, you don’t want to deal with sog-fest. Store them in an airtight container and keep them in the fridge. You can also freeze them for up to 3 months.
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Strawberry Cream Cheese Pastries
Soft, flaky, and delicious cream cheese dough filled with a sweet cream cheese and strawberry jam filling.
Ingredients
For the Pastries
- 1 package (8-ounces) cream cheese,, softened
- 2 sticks unsalted butter,, softened (16 tablespoons or 226 grams)
- 2 cups all-purpose flour
- powdered sugar for dusting
- ½ teaspoon salt
For the Filling
- 1 package (8-ounces) cream cheese,, softened
- ½ cup powdered sugar,, if you prefer it sweeter, add more powdered sugar
- 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
- strawberry jam
Instructions
- In your mixer's bowl, beat the cream cheese and butter until smooth, light, and fluffy.
- Add the flour and salt and continue to mix until thoroughly incorporated.
- Lightly dust your work area with powdered sugar.
- Transfer the dough to the work area and shape it into a ball.
- Divide it into 4 rounds; flatten each round and cover each round of dough with plastic wrap. Refrigerate for 30 minutes.
- In the meantime, prepare the filling by combining the cream cheese, powdered sugar, and vanilla in your mixer's bowl. Beat until creamy and smooth. Set it aside.
- Dust your work area with flour.
- Remove the dough from the fridge and let it rest for 5 minutes.
- Roll out each ball of dough to a 1/4-inch thickness. Then, cut it into 3×3 squares.
- Fill the center of each square with 1/2 teaspoon cream cheese mixture and 1/2 teaspoon strawberry jam. For a prettier presentation, using a pastry bag, you can pipe the fillings, one next to the other or one over the other.
- Overlap opposite corners of the dough to the center and over the filling. Pinch the seams together. Refrigerate the cookie for 1 hour.
- Preheat the oven to 375˚F.
- Remove the cookies from the fridge and bake them for 10 to 12 minutes, or until the edges are browned.
- Remove from the oven and cool completely.
- Serve.
Notes
- Cream Cheese: This recipe works best with full-fat cream cheese. Make sure it is softened before you start to work with it.
- Butter: Use two sticks of softened unsalted butter. That is 16 tablespoons or 226 grams of butter.
- Jam Filling: You can use whatever jam or preserves you have on hand. In fact, for a more authentic kolacky, you don’t even have to make the cream cheese filling – just use the jam.
- Do not skip the refrigeration time before rolling out the dough AND before baking the pastries.
- Store the pastries in airtight containers and keep them refrigerated. You can also freeze the cookies for up to 3 months. I suggest freezing them filled but not baked. When you need them, you can thaw them on the counter and then bake them as needed.
Nutrition
Serving: 1cookie | Calories: 168kcal | Carbohydrates: 11g | Protein: 2g | Fat: 13g | Saturated Fat: 8g | Polyunsaturated Fat: 1g | Monounsaturated Fat: 3g | Trans Fat: 0.3g | Cholesterol: 36mg | Sodium: 101mg | Potassium: 36mg | Fiber: 0.3g | Sugar: 3g | Vitamin A: 452IU | Calcium: 21mg | Iron: 0.5mg
Nutritional info is an estimate and provided as courtesy. Values may vary according to the ingredients and tools used. Please use your preferred nutritional calculator for more detailed info.
Did you make a recipe? Leave a rating
I actually “borrowed” your filling recipe for a quick breakfast, because I forgot to run to the store. I made the filling and put it in some Pillsbury crescent rolls and topped it with a simple icing. It worked wonderfully but, I have some filling left over. How long do you think will it last in the fridge?
Hi Cassie!! Your recipe sounds SO GOOD!!
What you can do is place the prepared cream cheese in an airtight container and refrigerate it for about 3 days.
Hello, ๐
stunning recipe an photos !!!!
can you tell me how much butter in grams
because in my country 1 stick = 250 grams
so..
thanks , and do other more like this !!!!
Please!!!!
Daniela
Hi Daniela!!
1 stick of butter in the USA is 1/2 cup butter which is equal to 4 ounces, or 113 grams. I hope that helps!
I’m really happy to know that you enjoy my recipes!! Thank YOU!! I’ll definitely post more recipes like this one as soon as we get into Fall and closer to the Holiday season. ๐
I can’t see where it says how many this recipe makes?
oops sorry, I found it.
26-30 so enough to take for a shower/party/funeral tea etc.
I am making these for my sisters baby shower on Saturday and I was going to go ahead and make them ahead of time and freeze them but when I thaw them out should I just thaw them in the refrigerator the day before and then just keep them in the fridge until ready to serve? Or are these better severed warmer?
Hi Lacy! These pastries are best at room temperature. When you take them out of the freezer, just let sit on the counter until completely thawed.
Have a wonderful time and congrats to your sister!!
On thanks!! I just didn’t want the pastry to get soggy! Thanks so much and can’t wait to try them!!
Hi! Just wondering, what is the need for refrigerating them? If my jam is a bit more liquid, will it seep through into the pastry? I don’t want them to get all soggy while refrigerating them… Thanks!
Hi, Snezhana! You have to chill the dough before rolling it out because the dough is hard to handle if at room temperature. By chilling the dough, we are giving the gluten time to settle down and relax. This makes your pastry dough easier to roll out and it won’t shrink during the baking process. Chilling also lets the moisture find its way back into the dough.
Try using a jam that is thicker with less liquid – you don’t want to end up with soggy cookies.
I hope this answers your questions! Let me know how it all goes.
Thanks!!
It went well, I’m making another batch today! ๐ do you have any tips on how to roll the dough out? Did you roll it into a rectangular shape? Because tht doesn’t work for me , so mine didn’t come out quite as pretty as yours!
Hi Snezhana!! Glad to hear they turned out well! Were you able to roll out the dough without it springing back? If that’s the case, then it needs to be chilled a bit longer. However, if your concern is about rolling it out “perfectly”, I would suggest to roll out each dough-disk into a rectangle and then cut the dough into squares using a pizza cutter. That’s my “secret”, if you will. haha ๐ Let me know how batch #2 turns out! Have a great weekend!!
Hi Kate…butter…is it unsalted?? Or salted?? I am going to make this tomorrow or the next day, depending on quickly I hear back from ya!! Thanks!! ๐
HI! ๐ Ooooh I wanna make a batch, too! Use unsalted butter… I should get in the habit of indicating that in my recipes, huh? ๐
These are awesome, been looking for this recipe for a lomng time. tanks for posting, keep up the great work!
THESE ARE AWESOME, BEEN LOOKING FOR THIS RECIPE FOR A LONG TIME, THANKS SO MUCH FOR POSTING, KEEP UP THE GREAT WORK!
These sound very much like the klatchkes from my childhood in an eastern European neighborhood. Lovely!
These look wonderful. I love the combo of strawberry and cream cheese. Yum!