Puff Pastry Month - the basic puff pastry recipe

Welcome to Puff Pastry Month!



I’m going to try and persuade everyone that making puff pastry at home is neither too difficult nor too time consuming for the average person. On top of that, making puff pastry is actually really fun (if you’re like me, which I suspect some people are not).

I will admit that the number of stages to this recipe does make it seem a bit daunting at first, but you can easily fit it in around your day. the recipe suggests 30 minutes resting time in the fridge after each stage, but I normally leave it for an hour or two which means I can go the gym or do the shopping etc. between each stage. You can even leave it overnight and spread it out over a few days, as the pastry will keep in the fridge for up to a week.

Another useful thing about making your own pastry is that you can make one big batch and then cut it up into smaller bits and freeze it. Then you can just take out however much you need from the freezer.

Below is the basic puff pastry recipe that can be used for both sweet and savoury pies or tarts. I will also be making chocolate puff pastry and rough puff pastry later on this month, and will be providing recipes with which to use each of them.

Things I have learnt about puff pastry:

Make sure the softened butter and the dough are at the same consistency when you begin to roll them together

Keep the sides of the dough neat and square with a pastry bench scrape or ruler. This makes for a more uniform dough and also ensures that it puffs up evenly

Don’t use too much flour on the worktop: it leaves streaks in the dough and prevents the dough from rising. Brush off any excess flour with a dry pastry brush as you fold the dough.

The dough should have between 6 and 8 complete turns, any more and the layers will be too thin and may split

Any fillings used should be chilled or at room temperature, otherwise they will melt the butter in the dough before it gets into the oven and the pastry won’t puff up correctly

Even if you make all of the above mistakes (which I did on my first attempt) you will still end up with a wonderful buttery pile of deliciousness that tastes a hundred times better than any shop-bought puff pastry!

 

Basic puff pastry recipe: makes around 600g of dough
(Adapted from Lorraine Pascale’s recipe over here)

245g plain flour
½ tsp salt
210g butter, softened
40g butter, chilled and cut into cubes
130ml cold water

Stage 1:

• Form the softened butter into a flat square, wrap in cling film and set aside
• Rub together the flour, salt and chilled butter to form fine breadcrumbs
• Make a well in the centre and pour in the cold water, mix the ingredients to form a smoothish dough
• Wrap the dough in cling film and chill in the fridge for 30 minutes

Stage 2:

• Roll the dough out into a rectangle twice the size of your square of butter 
• Put the butter on top of the pastry towards one end and fold the other half of the pastry over the top to cover the butter completely

• Bash the dough with the rolling pin a number of times to ensure the butter is evenly distributed throughout the pastry, then roll out the dough to form a long rectangle

• Fold the short edges in to meet in the middle, then fold in half again

• Turn the dough by 90° and repeat this folding and rolling process once more
• You have now completed two turns of the dough
• Wrap the dough in cling film and return to the fridge to rest for 30 minutes

Stage 3:

• Roll out and fold the dough for another two turns, as described above
• Put the dough back in the fridge for a further 30 minutes

Stage 4:

• Repeat with two more turns of the dough so that you have completed 6 in total
• Roll out the dough to the required shape and place on a baking tray
• Put back into the fridge for 30 minutes before baking
• Alternatively you can put the well wrapped dough in the freezer after completing the 6 turns