For many confectioners, preparing the perfect puff pastry is a big challenge.
A gem among desserts
Since it is a dough that is heat treated – fires, this phase of preparation, together with the correct ratio of raw materials, appears to be the most important.
According to the cookbook Culinaria Francie , Michaela Trogárová has developed several tricks for you directly from French confectioners , thanks to which you will be able to prepare perfect pinwheels, profiteroles, wreaths, balls and other popular desserts from this dough.
We also provide a basic recipe corresponding to the ratio of raw materials in a perfect baked dough according to French confectioners.
The best recipe for puff pastry
We need:
100 g of butter.
250 ml of water.
½ teaspoon of salt.
200 g plain flour.
4 eggs.
Procedure:
Pour water into the pot, add butter and a pinch of salt.
Bring the mixture to a boil, melt the fat and remove the pot from the stove.
At this point pour in the flour and start incorporating it.
When everything is combined into one mass, we return the pot to the stove again.Now we have to work really hard, because you will be mixing the dough all the time and at the same time firing it.
When it’s firm, pretty shiny and leaves a compact thin white layer on the bottom, it’s done.
Remove it from the stove again, let it cool for a few minutes (you can speed up the cooling process by tipping the dough into a glass bowl) and start beating in one egg at a time until you have a smooth and shiny dough.
We fill a pastry bag with the dough and spray it in the desired shapes on a baking sheet lined with baking paper.
You can make different shapes – balls, wreaths, pinwheels or boxes.
The secret of success is in baking
Confectioners know that baked dough is always prepared at high temperatures – you have to leave them especially at the beginning of baking.
So proceed like this – place the tray in the oven, which is preheated to 230 degrees.
Let it bake like this for ten minutes and then turn it up to 200 degrees.
After about another ten minutes, start watching how the surface of each piece looks.
They must be colored nicely golden, they cannot be white or dark brown.
This is very important because every oven bakes differently.
The most common problem in baking – the dough is liquid and does not hold its shape
The basis for the dough not to melt is two things – add the eggs gradually and after removing from the stove let it cool completely, that is, do not rush.
If the dough does not hold its shape at all (you put a teaspoon of dough on the baking paper and the pile starts to spread to the sides), it needs to be thickened a little.
But NEVER do it by adding only flour, the dough would not swell as much as it is needed and then it would not be possible to fill it properly.
If the dough is too liquid, dissolve the butter in the water again in the same proportions and add the flour to the mixture.
Leave to cool and then beat a little at a time into the original, more liquid dough.
Or – and that is usually a better option – start again and remove some water.
If the dough remains too liquid, it will not rise, it will be soft and moist.Just completely wrong.
Tips and tricks to perfection
In French pastry books, you often come across a simple mantra of 2: 1: 1: 2 (the basic dough recipe is approximately the expression of these proportions).
This is the ratio of the weight of the individual ingredients as you add them to the dough, i.e. 2 parts water, 1 part butter, 1 part flour and 2 parts eggs (eggs should therefore be chosen with regard to their size).
Depending on the type of flour (the ratio of gluten in the flour and its quality), the ratio may vary slightly.
Baked dough is named after the fact that when mixed with water and butter.
You seal the flour, the dough will start to burn from the bottom after a while – only a thin white coating remains on the bottom, the dough sticks to the wooden spoon and, last but not least, you can recognize its correct consistency by the fact that when you stick a spoon into it, it remains upright and does not move.
Last tip seasoned confectioners.
Lightly spray a baking sheet lined with baking paper over the entire surface with water from a spray bottle and only then spray the dough onto it with a bag.
As this water evaporates, it will help the road to inflate more effectively.
