Saturday, September 10, 2011

Tips and ideas on how to prepare a Flaky Pastry

It is little known, but the modern word <em> cakes </ em> (for a cake batter) comes from the Middle English word <em> paest </ em> (literally, a past made with flour and water, also can be enriched and thickened with egg yolks) and describes how both cakes were mostly made and used until the Middle Ages. In the beginning it was just a paste of flour and water (sometimes salt), which was to coat meat and fish used for cooking, so meat was protected from the direct heat from a fire. It also helped with cooking, as a coating around the meat inside was allowed steam to perfection in its own juices, making it very tender without loss of flavor. Typically, it was hard pastry casing and then broken and discarded and the meat inside was eaten (the same principle used to batter coating for fried fish today).

In the Middle Ages saw a person who batter in the bottom of the meat was tasty and light, and this may have led to experiments by mixing fat with flour and water mix. From this modern pastry was born.

In fact, the modern pastry work just because of the fats used in the dough. These fats provide separation of many layers of flour and confectioners and dries, making it both tasty and breadcrumb batter game.

If you base this cake and add an egg yolk or two, than the raw dough is elastic and richer in taste. To this basic mix, you can then add spices, herbs and other flavors to change how the basic dough taste.

You can also change the properties of dough using different combinations of oils or fats. Butter tends to have the best flavor (and a crumbly texture), but it's cool, crumbly texture that gives the best (that's why many chefs use half butter, half lard mix) - and will shorten the modern artificially replicate this quality of pig fat. Margarine gives a smoother less crumbly texture and a lighter overall color, which can be good for the fruit pies (and margarine are fairly neutral flavor, the taste of the stuffing to dominate). You can also insert with liquid oils, but these are difficult to handle and must be used with the same needs, they were popular between the 1860s and 1930s.

As for preparation, but the true secret of making good pastry is to ensure that all your ingredients, dishes and cutlery thoroughly cooled before use so that the fat does not melt before baking (this way you can get small whole lumps of fat in dough, and this improves both the taste and 'decay'. In preparation, you handle the dough as little as possible to ensure that ingredients are not too hot.

To make the sheet cake as filo pastry, puff pastry, croissant or pastries of the technique is slightly different because it lammellar (sheet) cake. Basically you have a basic cake mix to prepare, deploy and place butter (or other fat) on top and roll out until more grease. This process is repeated several times so that the layers of cake separated by layers of fat gain. When dough fats help the folded layers to separate, so you puffed and brittle effect.

The recipe below is a classic pastry and comes from an old family recipe and offers a perfect, light and flaky puff pastry a little each time.

Traditional cakes recipe

Ingredients:
240g self-raising flour
60g cold butter, cubed
60g chilled lard, cubed
30ml cold water (approx.)
pinch of salt

Method:
Sift the flour and salt in a large bowl and add the butter and lard. Use cold finger (dip in cold water or for hand-held under a cold tap), rub the fat into the flour (rub your thumb against your fingers), so the mixture looks like fine breadcrumbs.

Add water, one teaspoon at a time (you will probably take about 4 tablespoons), and using a knife (or your hands) to combine until mixture comes together into a dough. Whatever you do, do not take up too much water or the dough will be sticky and heavy. You just point the dough binds together with the water after a light pastry.

Press dough (if you have been careful), you can turn on a lightly floured surface and immediately roll out (if the dough still or hold together, you can cover with plastic wrap (plastic) and chill in refrigerator before use. In reality, the Roll the dough more difficult (ie it is a bit crumbly), the better the texture will be when you bake.

This recipe can be used for both sweet and savory dishes. But if you want to use it as a base for pies and sweet pies certain other add 25g brown sugar to the base mix above.

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