Pastry

I have occasionally, pretty much by accident, made amazing pastry. More usually it’s sort of cardboardy.

Can anyone help? The oven is sounding like the next thing to buy, and I’m getting cravings for pasties and apple pies.

[quote=“Loretta”]I have occasionally, pretty much by accident, made amazing pastry. More usually it’s sort of cardboardy.

Can anyone help? The oven is sounding like the next thing to buy, and I’m getting cravings for pasties and apple pies.[/quote]
I was just discussing this with the woman who shares my kitchen whose pastry comes out perfect every time.
In answer to your question:

  1. Handle the ingredients as little as possible, e.g. use a knife to cut the butter into the flour, only use your fingers for the final rub-in at the last minute.

  2. Get a big piece of marble to use as a work surface. Jojo goes to extremes and dumps bags of ice on it before she rolls. You want it COLD.
    You can get a marble pastry slab here for unreasonable amounts of money, or you can just steal one from a building site. Or so I’ve heard. :wink: (Mine’s black polished granite – thanks, ICBC – but works just as well.)

  3. when you’re handling the dough, keep a towel and a big bowl of icy cold water close to hand. Dip your hands in it frequently to cool them down.

  4. Let the dough rest in the chiller box of your fridge (NOT the freezer) for at least 30 minutes before you roll it out.

That’s really it – cold hands, cold work surface, cold ingredients, handle as little as possible.

ingredients?

Sorry, when you said yours sometimes works, I just assumed… oh well.

All you need is some floury stuff, which can be pretty well anything, but you want to avoid high gluten bread-making-type flours. One of my favourites is made from half plain flour, half ground walnuts.*

Yer basic shortcrust consistes of no more than 1/2 a pound of plain flour, a pinch of salt and 4 ounces of butter.

First, seive the flour and salt into a bowl. Hold the seive up high – think of getting as much air into the mixture as possible.

Next, have your butter cut into smallish lumps. Add them to the bowl and cut them nto the flour with a knife until you feel your wasting your time. Only then, with cold hands, gently rub the butter into the flour, using only your fingertips and lifting them high as you let the mix fall back into the bowl – again, incorporating air – until the mixture looks like rough breadcrumbs with maybe a few lumpy bits.

Then, sprinkle a tablespoon or two of ice water into it and start bringing the mixture together with the knife until the bits begin to cling to each other. You really don’t need much water at all – just enough to make it stick and no more. Right at the end, finish bringing it together with your cold, cold fingers until it forms a big lump and leaves the sides of the bowl clean.

Wrap it in clingfilm and throw it in the fridge to rest and chill before using it. This’ll be enough for a couple of tart/quiche-type things or a single pie with some left over. Don’t try rolling it straight from the fridge – let it sit for a bit first or you’ll have a bugger of a job flattening it out.

If you’re making a savoury pie, try adding some roughly grated sharp cheddar when you add the butter (reduce the amount of butter a little – experiment!) or if it’s a fruit pie, try the half and half with ground walnuts, and don’t forget to add a bit of sugar for a sweet pie.

Oh, and don’t forget to beat an egg yolk with a splash of milk to paint the crust with before it goes into the oven so it comes out shiny and enticing-looking – a light scattering of crunchy sea salt on top of everything before it goes in the oven, or a sprinkling of sugar if it’s a sweet pie, adds a nice effect, too.

*Understand that all credit for the above and any other pastry-related nuggets of wisdom are thanks to my wife – I’m crap at pastry.

One more thing. In books, it always says to use room-temperature butter, etc. but here in hot humid Taiwan you’ll be fucked if you do that unless you’re doing your baking at the coldest time of the year.

I used to make decent pastry but one day I just lost the knack and it wasn’t so good anymore. Not terrible, but a bit thick with a tendency to crack.

Next time I try, I’ll follow Sandman’s wife’s instructions to the letter and see if that helps.

I like the taste and texture of half wholemeal, half white flour pastry.

But you do take the butter out of the fridge for a while before you use it, don’t you? You don’t use it cold right out of the fridge, do you? That makes it hard to knead the dough evenly. I’ve made some good pies before (not in Taiwan) but after seeing your wife’s pies, I’m going to try here. :notworthy:

[quote=“elektronisk”]But you do take the butter out of the fridge for a while before you use it, don’t you? You don’t use it cold right out of the fridge, do you? That makes it hard to knead the dough evenly. [/quote]I’ve read some people recommending getting the butter really cold, perhaps in the freezer, then grating it. That means it can be combined with the flour evenly and quickly, without warming up too much.

Jojo has done that before. Works well.

You absolutely do not want to knead shortcrust pastry – that’s a surefire recipe for baked leather.