Try this delicious homemade strawberry puree in this easy, fruity recipe, perfect in pastries, to add flavor to your frostings, perfect cake filling like in my strawberry vanilla cake, cupcakes, and cheesecake batters, or topping your favorite desserts.
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Why you'll love this recipe
The strawberry puree recipe is nothing more than a mixture made from sweetened strawberries reduced to a smooth puree. It's used in patisserie to flavor cake and cupcake batters, frosting and more.
Made with just 3 ingredients - fresh strawberries or frozen strawberries, sugar, and lemon juice - strawberry puree is very similar to strawberry compote or strawberry coulis, only the texture is different.
It's a quick and easy recipe to make at home, and you can use it to flavor buttercream, cheesecake batter, sponge cake batter, like this strawberry buttercream cake, mascarpone whipped cream, ice cream, and more.
But this reduced strawberry puree is also amazing as a topping for cake, cupcakes, cheesecakes, and cookies, to add a fresh strawberry flavor to your drinks, smoothies, and the endless list goes on.
More strawberry desserts
Ingredients Notes
- Strawberries: You can use either seasonal fresh strawberries, or frozen strawberries to make this recipe year-round.
- Sugar: Essential to soften the tart flavor of cooked strawberries, you can use granulated sugar, or natural sugar such as honey, maple syrup, or agave syrup. (I don't recommend using brown sugar or coconut sugar, which could alter the strawberry flavor).
- Lemon: Use fresh lemon juice or bottled lemon juice to preserve the strawberry pulp.
⚠️ You'll find quantities and full instructions in the recipe card at the end of this page.
How to make Strawberry Puree Recipe
Cook Strawberries
- Place the fresh or frozen strawberries, sugar, and lemon juice in a medium saucepan.
- Cook over low heat, stirring occasionally, until you obtain a compote-like texture with softened pieces.
Tip: If you use frozen strawberries to make puree strawberries, the preparation time will be longer, as frozen berries contain more water and requires longer cooking to evaporate the excess liquid.
Mixing
- Blend in a blender or food processor, or directly with a hand mixer until smooth.
- If necessary, strain the strawberry purée through a fine mesh sieve to remove grains and residues.
*If you skip this blending stage, you'll have a simple strawberry puree with chunks like a compote with a texture very similar to strawberry jam, but less sweet.
How to use pureed strawberries
You can eat fresh strawberry puree with a spoon, serve it to your baby or use it for baking. Here are a few ideas:
- For flavoring icing, frosting like this whipped strawberry buttercream or this strawberry whipped cream frosting, or in Swiss meringue buttercream or vanilla white chocolate ganache.
- As a filling in your layer cakes like this strawberry whipped cream cake in these strawberry-filled cupcakes, or these chocolate cupcakes.
- Add a natural pink color and a sweet strawberry flavor to cake batter, cheesecake, cupcakes, pancakes and more.
- As a strawberry sauce to desserts like this berry pavlova, in cottage cheese with homemade granola or on a slice of New York cheesecake.
- In a drink like my iced strawberry matcha latte, in a smoothie like this strawberry banana smoothie, lemonade, or this strawberry milkshake.
Storage and Tips
In the fridge: Leftover puree keeps for 3-5 days in the fridge in a jar with a lid or an airtight container.
Can I freeze it? Yes, you can freeze leftover puree, once it has been completely cooled for 3 months, you can place them in an ice cube trays to defrost very small quantities.
How to get a thick texture? The longer you cook it, the more the liquid evaporates, giving it a thick texture. You can always add gelatine, flour or cornstarch to thicken it a little more.
How to make a sugar-free puree? I recommend adding sugar to soften the acidity of the fruit. You can always use natural sugar or agave syrup to make a healthy strawberry puree recipe.
FAQ - Frequently Asked Questions
Once pureed, strawberries keep better in the freezer than raw strawberries.
When the strawberries are cooked and softened, you can crush them with a fork or use a puree masher.
No, jam is half sugar and half fruit, strawberry puree contains less sugar.
You will also love
- Fresh strawberry galette
- Strawberry blueberry banana smoothie
- Strawberry shortcake crunch
- Strawberry cake pops
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How to make Strawberry Puree
- Total Time: 18 minutes
- Yield: 1 jar
Description
A concentrate of homemade strawberry purée made with just 3 ingredients, perfect for flavoring your frosting, and icings, into your cake or cupcakes as filling or to eat by the spoonful (for about 200 g of purée/ 1 cup jar).
Ingredients
- 400 g (2 cups) Strawberries - fresh or frozen
- 40 g (¼ cup) Sugar - granulated
- ½ lemon juice
Instructions
- Place the whole strawberries in a medium saucepan with the sugar and lemon juice.
- Cook over a medium heat for 5 minutes, then lower the heat and continue cooking for around 10-15 minutes until you have a thick, puree-like consistency with chunks of strawberries.
- Remove from heat and allow to cool completely.
- Blend the mixture in a food processor or with blender until smooth.
- Strain through a fine sieve if necessary to remove seeds and other residues.
- Place the strawberry purée in a glass jar with a lid and store in the fridge.
Notes
Storage: Refrigerate in a jar with a tight-fitting lid for around 1 week, or freeze for up to 3 months.
Sugar-free purée: Replace white sugar with maple syrup, honey or agave syrup.
- Prep Time: 3 minutes
- Cook Time: 15 minutes
- Category: filling, cream
- Cuisine: American
Keywords: strawberry puree, frozen strawberry puree, homemade strawberry puree, pureed strawberries, strawberry puree for cake, how to make strawberry puree, strawberry puree frozen strawberries
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