Puff Pastry

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CWS4322

Chef Extraordinaire
Joined
Jan 2, 2011
Messages
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Location
Rural Ottawa, Ontario
Am I the only one on DC who loves making puff pastry? Found a recipe for peach turnovers that needed puff pastry. Too lazy to drive the 16 miles to town and back to buy it. Got it in the fridge chilling so I can roll it out. I love making puff pastry. The process is so much fun. Anyone else?
 
No doubt it tastes a lot better than the store bought stuff. What is the dough like before you start the folding and rolling?
 
No doubt it tastes a lot better than the store bought stuff. What is the dough like before you start the folding and rolling?
Well, I do it in the food processor. At first, it is sticky, but then it gets to behave. I don't know how to describe it! I just know that it doesn't take that long and it behaves. I roll it 3 or 4 times, letting it rest in the freezer for 10-15 minutes in between. I made peach popovers for breakfast this morning. Still have dough in the freezer for something else.

I am too lazy to go to the store and buy stuff I can make from scratch. Besides which, it is about 20 miles. Got all the ingredients in the house, I'll make it. I admit, I am lazy.
 
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Most people think of it as lazy to buy pre-packaged pastry, not spend hours making it from scratch ;)

The closest I've come to making puff pastry is that I made croissants once. I would much rather buy them from a good bakery than do that again. What a PITA.

I've been watching old seasons of "The Great British Baking Show" lately and they make a quickie version called "rough puff." I might try that sometime.

http://thegreatbritishbakeoff.co.uk/pauls-fruit-turnovers/
 
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It's not too lazy for me to go to the store and get it (the closest is about 3 minutes away!), but I'm too cheap! lol And I'm sure there are chemicals in commercial puff pastry, like when you read the ingredients on a loaf of bread.

But seriously, I haven't made puff pastry for years, but I used to make it a lot, when I knew a lady that was into French foods. I don't remember where I found the method, but I wrote the recipe in my "Blue Book" (looseleaf notebook of favorite recipes), as "Easy Puff Paste". We compared it to the classic method of making puff paste, and it made pastries that rose almost as high as as the regular, and actually more even - the gluten is less developed in it, so it doesn't need as much restin. And incredibly more easy!

We also tested the bread flour in it - they called for AP or bread flour. We thought it was strange that this was an option, since cake flour was called for! But it didn't rise much more, and needed more resting, or the edges would not be as even, due to the elasticity. The AP flour worked better.

This is made in the FP, so maybe this is what you make, CWS.

Easy Puff Pastry

3 c Unbleached AP flour
1 c cake flour
1 tsp salt
1 lb cold, unsalted butter, cut into ½" cubes
1 c ice water, plus 1 tsp lemon juice, or
1 c sour cream + 2 egg yolks, for a richer
pastry

Combine flours and salt in FP, and process briefly to mix. Drop in the butter, and pulse several times, until the butter is the size of beans or peas. Add water and lemon juice, and pulse just until the dough begins to mass up on the blade.

Scrape dough out onto a lightly floured surface, and shape into about a 2" thick rectangle. Brush with flour, and roll into a 12" rectangle, ½" thick. Fold into three, turn 90°, and repeat. After folding, wrap in plastic, and chill 30 min. (Original recipe called for 1 or 2 more turns now, then resting, but I rest it once, briefly, before the final turn). Turn one or two more times, then wrap, and rest at least 4 hours, or up to 3 days; may also be frozen.

The 4 types of pastries I have listed are Straws, Arches, Palmiers, and Couques. The straws are the ones I would often make with pastry leftover from a main dish.

We would also make croissants from puff pastry - easier, and they have more butter in them!
 
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It's not too lazy for me to go to the store and get it (the closest is about 3 minutes away!), but I'm too cheap! lol And I'm sure there are chemicals in commercial puff pastry, like when you read the ingredients on a loaf of bread.

Chemicals in food don't scare me since everything is a chemical and the body is a chemical factory. Not that I recommend a diet of too much processed food; it's just not the boogeyman many people make it out to be.

I can think of many things I'd rather do than spend eight hours freezing and rolling puff pastry.
 
Chemicals in food don't scare me since everything is a chemical and the body is a chemical factory. Not that I recommend a diet of too much processed food; it's just not the boogeyman many people make it out to be.

I can think of many things I'd rather do than spend eight hours freezing and rolling puff pastry.
It really doesn't take 8 hours of actual labor time to make puff pastry, obviously (I know you were using that for dramatic effect). Just like I tell people it doesn't take that long to make bread, unless you stand there and watch the dough rise, and again, watch the loaves bake!

As for chemicals, weren't you the one concerned about a certain chemical I sprayed outside?
I know many of those things we read are just the chemical names of everyday things, but many are things that they are finding out more about, as time goes on, that have been deemed "safe", for decades.

For all I know, the commercial puff pastry has only Flour, Butter, Water, and Salt in it, and maybe an acid, like the lemon juice. But I doubt it.
 
...For all I know, the commercial puff pastry has only Flour, Butter, Water, and Salt in it, and maybe an acid, like the lemon juice. But I doubt it.


Wouldn't that be nice!

Find the butter in Pepperidge Farm Puff Pastry Sheets.

Ingredients
Made From: Unbleached Enriched Wheat Flour (flour, Niacin, Reduced Iron, Thiamine Mononitrate [vitamin B1], Riboflavin [vitamin B2], Folic Acid), Water, Vegetable Oils (palm, Soybean, Hydrogenated Cottonseed), Contains 2 Percent Or Less Of: High Fructose Corn Syrup, Salt, Mono And Diglycerides, Soy Lecithin, Malted Barley Flour, Turmeric And Annatto Extracts For Color.
 
It really doesn't take 8 hours of actual labor time to make puff pastry, obviously (I know you were using that for dramatic effect). Just like I tell people it doesn't take that long to make bread, unless you stand there and watch the dough rise, and again, watch the loaves bake!

Please don't insult my intelligence. No, it's not constant, but it's definitely not like making bread. Freeze for 15 minutes, fold & roll, freeze, fold & roll, repeat several times. There's little opportunity for multi-tasking, so it might as well be constant.

IAs for chemicals, weren't you the one concerned about a certain chemical I sprayed outside?
Was I? Sorry, I've been on painkillers for the last few weeks following surgery. Can't remember everything I've done or written ;)

II know many of those things we read are just the chemical names of everyday things, but many are things that they are finding out more about, as time goes on, that have been deemed "safe", for decades.

The dose makes the poison [emoji2] A teeny amount of X scary chemical isn't going to kill you.
 
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Oh my. I just like making puff pastry. It doesn't take 8 hours, or maybe I am doing it wrong. I like to fold the butter in, fold it, fold it, roll it, fold it, roll it. Okay, I admit I have a guide that I use, but it is so much fun to see it puff. You get the picture.
 
Oh my. I just like making puff pastry. It doesn't take 8 hours, or maybe I am doing it wrong. I like to fold the butter in, fold it, fold it, roll it, fold it, roll it. Okay, I admit I have a guide that I use, but it is so much fun to see it puff. You get the picture.
Is your recipe posted?
 
Is your recipe posted?
Oh gosh, don't have a recipe. I use 1 cup + of cold butter, flour, ice water, a bit of salt, a bit of bp. My grandma taught me how to make this, and you just mix it all until it feels right. Now I use my food processor. Some things you just know how to do.
 
Oh my. I just like making puff pastry. It doesn't take 8 hours, or maybe I am doing it wrong. I like to fold the butter in, fold it, fold it, roll it, fold it, roll it. Okay, I admit I have a guide that I use, but it is so much fun to see it puff. You get the picture.
I was referring to croissants, since, as I mentioned, they're the closest thing to puff pastry that I've made.
 
I don't think I'll be making puff pastry anytime soon! I will comment however that so many recipes use the food processor to mix things. Most of the time, it is easy to do in a stand mixer but this is one that looks like the processor would help with mixing the cold butter and flour together better than a mixer. I don't own a food processor. Got rid of it years ago because it was a PITA to set up and clean. Now I don't have room for another appliance.
 
I've only recently found out a recipe that suits perfect to me, I have made several attempts in the past but these were always a little below the threshold of being really called puff pastry.

This recipe I've found out and already experimented takes only 40 mins!
 
I've only recently found out a recipe that suits perfect to me, I have made several attempts in the past but these were always a little below the threshold of being really called puff pastry.

This recipe I've found out and already experimented takes only 40 mins!

Would you post Your recipe for us

Thanks
Josie
 
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