I decided that I would begin to make some videos that demonstrate how to make various types of pastry. This is so that I can then refer to these videos, rather than demonstrating how to make the pastry in every recipe that needs it.
The first one is Rough Puff Pastry. Puff pastry, especially home-made is wonderful, but rough puff pastry is a very good alternative as it gives almost as much puff, but for much less effort. Of course you can always buy puff pastry in a store, but the quality is variable. Some have ‘all butter’ others just use a vegetable shortening which drastically affects the flavour. So for me I like to make my own and this quick version works great for so many things.
Puff pastry takes many hours to make, but rough puff can be done in less than two hour and give a great result.
Once made the pastry can be chilled and kept for at least a week, or frozen and kept for months, so making double batches is a good idea, freezing half for later use.
The recipe below will easily make enough to roll out into a 25cm x 25cm square(12inch x 12inch), so it is perfect for things like turnovers, plaits, sausage rolls, beef wellington etc.
Having made the pastry I will use it, in a later post, to make a sausage plait. In fact I will be making two, one with this pastry and one with shop bought puff pastry, just to compare.
Ingredients:
- 160g (1 1/4 cups) plain flour
- 160g (1/2 cup + 3 tbps+1 tsp) chilled butter in cubes.
- 80ml(1/3 cup) ice cold water
- 1/2 tsp salt.
Method:
Place the flour into a large bowl and add the salt and butter.
Using a knife, or a pastry cutter, cut the butter into the flour until the cubes have been reduced to small chunks, slightly larger than breadcrumbs
Some larger flecks are fine too.
Add most of the water, retaining a little for later if needed, and mix in to create a dough.
Work the dough together, using a hand if necessary, to pull it together, but still with flecks of butter showing.
Form into a square disk about an inch thick and wrap in plastic wrap and chill for at least 20 minutes.
Lightly flour the work surface and roll out the chilled dough to an oblong with a length 3 times the width.
Brush off any excess flour and fold one third the length onto the middle third,
then fold the remaining third on top of that. This is known as a single turn.
Turn the pastry so that an open edge is facing you and roll out to an oblong again.
Repeat the folding as before. That is now 2 turns.
Repeat the rolling and folding between 4 and 6 more times(depending on your patience, I prefer 6 as it gives more layers). If the dough seems to get warm and sticky refrigerate for 20 mins before continuing).
When you have completed 4 to 6 turns wrap the dough and chill in the fridge for at least 30 minutes before rolling out and using. It can be stored for about a week in the fridge and much longer in the freezer.