This turned out to be super simple and a quick preparation. The recipe comes from Taste of Home and they have a nice video of the preparation. It was SO good that I made it again the next day using gluten-free flour (Namaste Perfect Flour Blend) and it turned out great, too. I used fresh raspberries, but I’m going out on a limb to say frozen would work, too. The most delicious part of this dish is the lemon goodness inside the pinwheels. Genius!

  • RASPBERRY SAUCE INGREDIENTS
  • 3-4 cups raspberries
  • 2/3 cup sugar
  • 2 Tbsp. corn starch
  • 1/4 tsp. ground cinnamon
  • 1/8 tsp. ground nutmeg
  • 1/8 tsp. salt
  • 1 cup cold water
  • PINWHEELS INGREDIENTS
  • 1 cup flour (regular or gluten-free)
  • 2 tsp. baking powder
  • 1/2 tsp. salt
  • 3 Tbsp. shortening
  • 1 large egg, lightly beaten
  • 2 Tbsp. half-and-half cream
  • Flour (regular or gluten-free) for the rolling surface
  • 2 Tbsp. melted butter
  • 2 tsp. grated lemon zest
  • 1/4 cup sugar

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F. Spread the raspberries in an ungreased 8×8″ or 11×7″ baking dish.

In a saucepan, stir together sugar, corn starch, cinnamon, nutmeg, and salt. Stir in the cold water and cook over medium heat, stirring constantly until the mixture boils and thickens. Pour this syrup over the raspberries. Bake at 400 degrees F for ten minutes. Remove from heat.

While the raspberries are baking, stir together the flour, baking powder, and salt. Cut in the shortening with a pastry cutter or knives until the mixture is crumbly. Combine the egg with the half-and-half cream and stir it into the crumb mixture to form a stiff dough.

Shape the dough into a log and then, on a lightly floured surface, roll it out into a 12×6″ rectangle. Combine the butter, zest, and sugar. Spread it on top of the dough to within a half inch of the edges. Roll the dough starting on the long side, jelly-roll style. Cut the roll into ten slices. Pat each slice slightly to flatten, then place them atop the raspberry sauce.

Bake at 400 degrees for 15-20 minutes or until pinwheels are golden. Remove from heat and serve warm or cold. Tastes great with ice cream or cream.

GLUTEN-FREE NOTES . . . the three pictures above are of my gluten-free product. My dough was far too stiff, so I should have added more half-and-half cream, but I didn’t add enough. The dough was on the verge of crumbling apart, but I was able to get it to roll. Whew! When I patted the slices to flatten them a bit, they didn’t hold their shape very well because the dough was too dry. Ah, well. IT WAS DELICIOUS! The third picture in this series is so you can see what it looked like from the side after it was baked. The raspberries were so beautiful through the glass baking dish. A good photographer could have a great time with this recipe.

This is a small portion of my raspberry patch. I ran out to pick enough raspberries for this dessert each day that I made it. That was in addition to the 12 pounds in my freezer for this winter. I LOVE raspberries!

More notes about this recipe . . . it was super, super simple to prepare, but it did make a lot of dirty dishes. This is always a concern for me. Anyway, you will need a baking dish, saucepan, mixing bowl, and vessel to melt butter and make the pinwheel filling. That is in addition to the measuring cups and pastry cutter. Just be prepared. I had never treated raspberries this way and that’s why I thought it was genius to pour the syrup over the berries. So often a raspberry recipe ends up mushing the raspberries because they are an incredibly fragile fruit. But this recipe does not require one to stir the raspberries . . . ever. It’s so beautiful!