Day: 2 October 2022

Another recipe where you can use puff pastry. For visualization, this video.

Pastry Cream Ingredients:

• 500ml milk
• 2 eggs
• 4 yolks
• 125g sugar
• 75g plain flour
• 50g butter
• 1 ts vanilla paste
• pinch of salt
• glass sugar to cover the cream

Process:

• In a pan, put the milk to boil. Add a bit of sugar and dont stir it!
• In a bowl, mix eggs, yolks, sugar and vanilla. Then Add flour. Mix all well. Add a pinch of salt.
• Just when the milk starts boiling, remove from the heat, and pour it bit a bit in the egg mix.
• Return the mix to the pan, and dont stop stirring, this is the key for cooking the flour!
• Keep stirring until the mix thickes up. You should see bubbles forming up.
• Remove from the heat and add the butter. Mix until all combined.
• Spread the cream in a clean tray, spread sugar on top so a crust doesnt form.
• Cover with cling film and put into the fridge.

Baking pastry layers:

• Pre-heat oven at 200C
• Cut a baking paper with the shape of your baking tray.
• In a lightly floured surface, roll out the puff pastry in a long rectangle like your tray using the paper mould.
• Using the paper as a mould, trim the sides. Put the paper back in the tray and then put on top the pastry.
• “Docker” the pastry with a fork.
• Bake for 20 minutes or until golden.
• Using another tray, place on top of the pastry and push it so the pastry keeps flat. Bake for another 15 minutes or so.
• Remove from oven, remove top tray and check the pastry in golden brown and flat. Cool down in a rack before next step.
• Using a paper mould (rectangle) cut three pieces from your pastry. Use a serrated knife and be careful.
• Chop very finally left over pastry
• Assembling time. Take the cream from the fridge, put it in a bowl and mix so takes a bit of room temperature. Using a piping bag, fill with one cup of cream. Using your hand on the bottom of the bag and dont put too much cream. Use the index finger to roll the bag in the nozzle before adding the cream.
• Using one piece of pastry as the bottom layer, in the middle, make a line with the cream. Then two layer on top, and two bottom. Total 5 layers. Add another piece of pastry on top. Trim the sides of cream with a spatula or small knife, fill the pockets with cream.
• Using the left over pastry crumbs, cover the cream sides with it.
• Add the cream again in the middle pastry layer like in the bottom. One line in the middle, two top, two bottom. Add the final (be sure it is the best piece) pastry piece on top.
• Again, trim the side of cream with a spatula or small knife, fill the pockets with cream.
• With a shiver, spread glass sugar on top.

Ready to eat!

Doesnt look like in the video but it was tasty!

Using the puff pastry recipe. We can do the following:

Sausage Roll ingredients:

• 400g puff pastry
• 450g sausage meat
• salt, pepper, extra spices of your choice
• 60g pickle, (Stilton cheese optional)
• 1 egg beaten
• sesame seeds

Process

• pre-heat oven at 200C
• mix meat, salt, pepper. Roll it a long shapped sausage.
• Roll out pastry to the length of your sausage. And 3-4 times wider. Trim edges to make it neat.
• Spread the sausage nearly in the middle of the pastry. Add the pickle lenghtway the sausage (and cheese). Roll the pastry on top the meat until enclosed, you will have some left over pastry. Leave only aprox 3cm, trim the rest (but dont throw it away!)
• With a fork (and a bit of flour), flatten the edge so it is enclosed properly.
• Eggwash the pastry, then score in diagonals (both directions).
• Spread some sesame seeds on top. Cut in 4 pieces with a sharp knife.
• Put the rolls in a tray with baking paper.
• Bake in the oven for 30 minutes or until golden-brown. If you have a thermometer, the meat should reach 165C to be cooked (I think).

This will make 4 big sausage rolls

Eccles cakes ingredients:

• 15g butter
• 75g dried currants
• 1 tbs of mixed peel fruit
• 25g demenara sugar
• 1/2 ts mixed spice
• 250g puff pastry
• 1 egg
• 2 tbs sugar

Process:

• pre-heat oven at 220C
• in a small sauce pan, over medium heat, melt butter. Add currant, mixed peel, demenara sugar and spice. Stir until sugar is disolved and fruit properly coated. Remove from heat.
• Put a bit of flour in a work surface and roll out the pastry to 1/2cm thick. Using a circle mould (10-13cm diameter), cut as many pieces as you can.
• Put the fruit mix in the middle of each circle. Wash with a bit of water the edges. Pull all edges together in the middle like a parcel. Pinch it so it doesnt open. Invent the parcel and flatten it with slap of your hand.
• Brush each cake with eggwash and sprinkle with sugar.
• Score each cake with 3 cuts. Put them in a tray with baking paper.
• Bake for 15 minutes or until golden.

Quite tasty everything!

This is a good example for a visualization of the process:

Ingredients:

• 250g plain flour
• 5g salt
• 135ml cold water + squeeze a bit of lemon
• 200g cold butter

Process:

• Mix flour and salt in a bowl
• Gradually add water, mixing with one hand. Mix all together.
• Put the dough in a work surface. And knead (bull method) with both hands, until smooth. Aprox 10-15 minutes depending on conditions.
• Put the dough back in the bowl, cover and leave it rest.
• We are going to make a parcel with the butter. Take a baking sheet paper and fold it in 3 parts horizontally, then do the same thing vertically. Once you unfold the paper, you will have 9 “squares”. Put the butter in the middle square, and fold again the paper until you have a parcel. With a rolling pin, flatten the butter until forms an uniform square thanks to the baking paper.
• Take your dough, with a rolling pin and using the butter parcel as a reference, spread the though to make a rectangle 1cm wider in each side compared with the butter and in double in length (plus 1cm extra on top and bottom). The goal is to enclose the butter with the dough.
• Once you have your dough spread out, put the butter (be sure is cold), in the top part, use the bottom part to cover the dough. Be sure the butter is covered by the four sides.
• With a bit of flour in your rolling pin, start to press down the pastry to squash the butter gently.
• Roll the pastry into rectangle lenthways.
• Folding process. Take the top 1/3 of the dough and fold it down the center. Now take the remaining bottom half and fold it up. Turn the pastry 90 grades like you have a book (the seam on the left). Repeat the process, spread lengthways and fold as book. This is a double fold.
• Rest 30 minutes in the fridge (wrap in cling film) (important the butter is firm and never melts!) and do another double fold.
• Again 30 minutes rest and another double fold.

Now the dough is ready for action. You can keep in the fridge for at least one week before you use it. Always keep it wrapped properly in cling film.