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number of French pastries, but any leftover pieces are good by themselves. They taste like rich,
buttery croissants. Rightly so—they have twice the amount of butter than croissants.
This recipe calls for a mixture of cake and all-purpose flour—the combination works well
for a good puff pastry dough. If you have no cake flour, use all-purpose. You will still get a
perfectly good pastry. The vinegar in the recipe helps to relax gluten that makes rolling easier.
Ingredients
1
1
1
cup cake flour
cup all-purpose flour
/3 teaspoon salt
½
cup water
1½ teaspoons vinegar
½
pound (225 g) unsalted butter, warmed slightly to about 50°F (10°C)
1
tablespoon flour
Procedure
. Blend the two flours and salt on a large cutting board with a spoon, by hand or with a
bench scraper, and form it into a mound. Make a well in the center.
. Add vinegar to water and pour into well. With fingers or bench scraper combine water
1
2
and flour to form a dough. Add slightly more water or flour to make the dough workable, not sticky,
not dry. Cut about 1 tablespoon off from butter and use fingers or pastry cutter to thoroughly cut it
into the dough. Knead just until smooth and elastic. Wrap dough in a plastic wrap and chill at least
12 hours.
3. Dust cutting board with 1 tablespoon flour. Place butter over flour and knead the flour
into the butter with the heal of your hand. Flour absorbs the extra moisture from butter. Work very
quickly before the butter has the chance to warm up. Form kneaded butter into two flat rectangular
block about 4x4 inches (10x10 cm) each. Chill.
4. Warm both dough and butter slightly before the next step. The ideal temperature to work
it is about 55º to 60°F (13º to 16°C). Roll out dough on a flour-dusted surface to an elongated
rectangle 14x5 inches (35x12 cm). Place first butter block over the lower third of the rectangle, fold
dough and butter over the center third, place second butter block on dough and fold over top third.
Seal edges by pressing with finger.
5. Very gently roll dough out into a elongated rectangle, making sure that butter doesn't ooze
out around the edges. Should butter start warming up, return to refrigerator for 15 minutes. Starting
from the short end, fold into three business-letter fashion. Rotate dough on the board 90°, dust a
little more flour on board and rolling pin and roll again into a rectangle as before. Fold once more
into three and gently flatten dough with the rolling pin. Wrap in plastic wrap and chill at least 30
minutes (longer chilling will not hurt dough).
6. Repeat rolling out and folding twice more then chill again for 30 minutes. You should
have a total of six folds. Refrigerate for several hours before using dough. Warm up 10 minutes
before final use.
Recipe makes 1¼ pounds (570 g) pastry, enough for 6 to 8 turnovers or similar size pastries.
The pastry freezes well. Best to cut and roll it into size and shape into your intended application, and
freeze, stacked with plastic wrap or waxed paper in between.
play © erdosh 340
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