Our second “Pastry Monday” concentrated on puff pastry. You probably know it’s a dough that takes time to make. When making it there’s 6 rounds of rolling, folding and rotating. You end up with a pastry made of thin layers of dough and butter that puffs up beautifully when baked. This is why it’s called puff pastry in English and in French it’s more like in Hebrew: The leafs pastry. I took about a thousand pictures so I hope you can enjoy as much as I do, just imagine the smell of baked buttery dough in the room constantly while reading/looking at the pics. Good luck!
Picking up our order for today's class
A bit of organization before we start.
Ericka slicing squares from the dry butter, special product for puff pastry
Demo of making the dough. Flour, hole, salt, melt with cold water
Start picking up the flour with the water
Water + flour makes étrempe
Not to waste the dough that got stuck between the fingers
Make a ball. Cut a cross or what we did instead..
Loosen it up with the roll, rest for 30min
Hit the butter, but keep it square. The butter should have the same thickness and flexibility as the étrempe
Flat the dough to a square as well, bigger then the butter square
Wrap the butter with the dough "like a Love Letter"
Love letter ready to go
First rolling, keeping the edges with straight angles
Fold to three
One round is done!
Rotate quarter of a spin and roll down again
My time to try, this is my love letter with butter inside
Rolled once
My dough was a bit too soft :/
Two finger printed on the dough, marking it's after 2 rounds. Rest for 20-30 min again
4 rounds. Rest again. This dough has to have a lot of rest otherwise it's too elastic like rubber
6 rounds are over, now rest for the last time before working with it
While the dough was resting we were working. Prepared the other stuff of course. For the Créme pâtissiére started with 3 yolks beaten with sugar
add starch, to get this texture
Boiled 500ml of milk with half a vanilla pod
Poring the boiling milk to the beaten yolks gradually
Whisking and putting back to the pot
Whisking over heat non-stop
Suddenly it's clotting, remove from heat, keep whisking, do not burn
Move for blast freezer to chill
Preparation of the fruits: figs, raspberries and strawberries.
Demo of the baking of the dough. Half of it rolled down for a rectangle, poked and turned around.
Stick two strips in the sides with egg wash
Connect the two layers, giving the edge a bit of fanciness
To the oven
The other half was rolled down to a rectangle and pressed down with another tray so that it will not rise thorough the baking. Then sugar coated and back to finish the baking
Chef's pastry came out the oven beautiful and golden
Créme pâtissiére inside in a flat layer
Already looks good
Arrange the fruits
The Chef's finished products
Mine came out with a bit of a twisted top. Still don't understand what caused it.
But I had more room to fill with fruits. Glazed.
Layering the Mille-Feuille
First floor lives raspberries and halfed strawberries
Foundation for the second floor
In the second floor lives figs and strawberries
Finished. OK I know, It's huge, I was supposed to trim the edges off. I didn't. Never mind, You can be sure I trimmed them at home
My finished Tarte Feuilletée aux Fruits
Oh wait! We're not done! With Chef Antoine there's always something to do with the trimmings
Rolled them to a square, wraped in sugar and folded
Took our rolls from the fridge..
Cut the roll and spread on a tray, open the "ears" out
Chef's cookies are perfect as usual. We ate a bunch of them on the spot
Mine looks pretty good too!
This is the TA I had to carry this afternoon.
At home, trimming the edges
My little "elephant ears"!!!
It was a long day, We didn’t finish on time, rushed the presentation time even though it’s the best part! And yet missed lunch this day. Chef was cool to let us eat his whole cakes as lunch. Did I also mention I tasted all the Créme pâtissiére from the tools and bowls? Of mine and others 🙂 I went to the cafeteria anyways and was lucky to get a piece of fish from one of the pastry girls (gotta have some protein with all this carbs all day!!). Another important thing to mention is that we made the class in the pastry kitchen where it’s cool and nice. Too cool? My nose was running all day and I was thinking about our nice and warm 139 kitchen where it’s always always warm.
Yummy. can I come on Mondays?
BTW, your edges curled out probably because when you did the egg wash on the strips it got also on the (out)side of the strips and then it cooks first & holds the pastry down… But it looks fabulous anyway!
I look forward to reading your blog every day! keep up the good work!
Love,
Elisheva
OK yes! That explains it, I did put some on the edges and then figured I’m not supposed to but it was too late 🙂 You’re welcome any day
WOW!!!
IT looks so good that probably I am not allowed even to look .
Barak plays on the piano and wonderfully sings ” wish you were here” and I am reading/ mostly LOOKING on the pics thinking…. wish you were here even just for this weekend.
We will be in few houres on Ginton’s grave – I remembered the day when you were 1 year old all naked seating on the front porch in Safta’s Jean house pealing a pomegranet with Ginton. the famouse picture that Nachman took that day realy captured your concentration on the pomegranet in your hands and on Ginton’s hands peeling the other part. Maybe your first cooking lesson?
I had a tear in my eye while reading your comment at the metro. Thanks!
[…] puff pastry part you have already seen here and here. This time was no different except it was easier. The more interesting part was the […]