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Author:
Melissa Collins
Puff pastry dough makes a base for many dishes. Give yourself plenty of time when making the dough, as it requires a great deal of patience and commitment. Rest assured that the end product would be well worth the effort, as this recipe will produce flaky, buttery, delicious puff pastry.
Puff pastry is the basis of an elegant flaky dough with buttered layers that simplify the baking process. The pastry is made by folding in and rolling out until it’s done. You can use it as a base when preparing different dishes from breakfast recipes, snacks, desserts, and at times dinner meals.
The best aspect about puff pastry is that you can prepare the dough earlier before you plan to make your recipe. Once you have the dough, the other steps are quick and simple. You can purchase ready-made puff pastry dough if you are a busy person. Nonetheless, we shall take you through the steps on how you can prepare puff pastry at the comfort of your home.
While buying the dough may sound like a good deal, the best option is to make it at home because you can always prepare more dough and store some in the freezer for later usage. With this puff pastry cake recipe, you will realize that the other steps are quite faster and easy once you have the dough.
However, if you need to make something quick and you don’t have the puff pastry, you might end up with disappointments because preparing a puff pastry requires time and effort. That is why you must plan and, if possible, always have some in the freezer.
Furthermore, you can use the dough immediately after kneading. You must store it in the fridge for some time for it to be effective. That is why you need to plan and have your dough before preparing your recipe.
When frozen, puff pastry is similar to pie dough. It looks thick and a bit heavy. Yet when puff pastry bakes, it puffs up; often, the baked dough will be several times its pre-baked thickness. Baking the dough forces a reaction between the fat (the butter) and the dough’s air, resulting in layer upon layer of thin, flaky sheets. This is why before use, the dough needs to be kept in the freezer.
Some meals made with puff pastry needs to be served shortly after preparation. This is because some meals may lose flakiness and have a soft undesired texture if left for too long before serving. Once out of the oven, allow the meal to cool slightly, then serve right away.
Cakes made from puff pastry have no rising agents. They use the dampness and air escalating from the stove enables the final product to double in size. While in the baking process, the product puffs upwards and outwards, then form several layers to enable even heating and produce succulent cake layers.
The extraordinary flakiness originates from the overlaid batter transform by collapsing fat into the mixture, collapsing, moving, and turning through control. Again, the batter produces the dampness.
If you want to produce the best puff pastry products, ensure you prepare the oven in advance. Most recipes will show you how you need to preheat the oven before you start baking.
The reason for preheating the oven well is because butter is a good conductor of heat. When you place the product in a preheated oven, the butter helps convert the moisture in the dough to steam and heat the air. The heated steam helps to keep the pastry layers dry and to set the dough starches faster
There are several approaches you can use to prepare puff pastry. The critical element is to form a glue with several layers of the fat and the dough mixture. The point here is to ensure when the heat is applied, the dough will rise are layers bake evenly.
With the puff pastry cake recipe, you need to master the art of folding in and rolling out. You should not overdo, and at the same time, you should not underdo. Again, to keep accuracy, ensure you check the measurements of the ingredients. Especially in butter, you must be careful and follow the recipe direction to get excellent results.
When making puff pastries, you should avoid the following mistakes:
As discussed above, puff pastry products rely on extreme heat to rise and cook through. If you set low temperature, be sure to get a flat end-product. With puff pastry, the rule is, “The higher the temp, the great the results.”
You must wait for the frozen puff pastry dough to thaw well before you can unfold it. Whether you bought the dough or made it at home, it will break or crack if you unfold it before thawing, thus rendering it useless. You can leave the puff dough for 30 minutes under room temp or plan earlier by putting it in the fridge overnight.
Whenever rolling the dough and folding in, always sprinkle some flour on the working surface to avoid the dough sticking and making the whole process complex.
You will need to roll out the dough several times. However, that does not mean you overdo it because it will affect the final meal. Of course, you will roll, cut, and shape according to your preferences. Whatever the case, handle the dough gently so that you can get a light and crisp meal out of it.
Butter is among the significant ingredients in puff pastry. If left at room temp for a long time, the butter will soften and melt away, making the dough sticky and hard to use. In the end, you won’t get the desired product in terms of shapes. To avoid such a mess, check your timings and handle small dough pieces while the other dough is in the fridge. Again, only remove the dough from the refrigerator when you are ready to start working on it.
The dough:
Egg mixture:
For the custard:
For the lemon spread:
Start with the egg mixture. Combine the water, vinegar, vodka, salt, egg, and egg yolk.
Mix the butter and flour to a crumble texture, add flour, and form large crumbles.
When the crumbles are fine, add the egg mixture, three tablespoons at a time, as you mix the dough.
Once the dough combines evenly, form a large log, then cut into 6
Roll each part, then transfer it to the freezer for 30 minutes, then put it in the fridge for another 30 minutes.
As the dough chills, mix the sugar, eggs, and yolks and whisk to get a light-yellow color. Mix in the half & half and milk.
Put the mixture over medium heat cook as you stir. Allow the mixture to thicken. Once cooked, put aside to cool as you stir occasionally.
Take a bowl and beat the butter until creamy. Add the cooled egg mixture as you stir in small portions at a time until done.
Preheat the oven to 4000F the start preparing the chilled dough.
Sprinkle the flour on the working surface, take one piece of the dough from the fridge, and then roll on the floured surface. Turn as you flour the surface to avoid sticking.
Have a lined kitchen towel where you will place the baked layers.
Put the prepared dough on a baking tray and pierce with a fork in different places.
Bake for 7 minutes until browned.
Roll the other layers as another layer is baking and repeat the same process.
Stack baked layers to cool as you prepare a dish to put your cake together.
Grate the lemon and mix with sugar so that you put it on the middle layer.
Put some of the crème at the serving dish surface where the first layer will settle.
Arrange the other layers as you spread the crème mixture on top of each layer.
Put the last layer with the bottom side facing up, then spread the remaining butter crème on top as you fill-up the gaps between layers. Chill the cake for 2 hours, then serve chilled.
