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Wednesday, 9 November 2016

Something Old, Something New! A Recipe For Perfectly Sweet, Sweet Pastry


When I first started out on the road to becoming a chef.... and I still haven't reached my destination yet by the way!.....like any other chef, as I began to gather skills and experiences from other more skilled professionals, I also began to gather recipes, but this as far as I can tell is normal practice in our profession. Ask any chef and they will probably have their own favourite recipes too, those tried and trusted basics that they can rattle off the list of ingredients to and most likely make with their eyes closed. These are the recipes we know are fail-safe and will never let us down, even during the busiest of services.

I too began my own compendium of recipes and tips. Some were truly reliable and others I altered from their original source to suit my own tastes and needs. Eventually through years of experimentation I developed what I classed as my own creations, they may be called classic names but the quantities of ingredients and how I treat them are pretty much unique to me. Every chef will for example make pastry in their own way. Yes we may all rub fat into flour but we all feel our ingredients differently....some may like their butter to feel firmer, some softer maybe more towards room temperature. Some like the feel of a coarse flour, some a fine flour. No two chefs will rub butter into flour to the exact same point, as we like all humans, we see and feel things differently too.



Once we chefs have found what works best for us we will cling to our recipes and methods like limpets to rocks, some may even guard their secrets zealously and refuse to share them with others, and years ago when I was in the thick of the competitive world chasing prime awards such as a Michelin Star, I too would have been a practising zealot!...my real recipe for sticky toffee pudding would be a prime example.

From my first foray into the professional kitchen, I had been taking notes, jotting down recipes and forming ideas of my own for future reference, compiling them in a bright cerulean blue hard backed notebook. This book was a treasure, in fact I wouldn't have swapped it for the crown jewels!
I had recipes for a multitude of different breads, pastry doughs, recipes for sweet and savoury mousses, perfect souffles, pates, sauces, stocks, cake batters, scones and pastries for afternoon tea, chutneys, jams, essences...oh you name it, I probably had a recipe for it or some note or comment to make about it.

The cover of the book had lasted the course, it was wipe-able but the pages inside weren't.... there were pages dotted with splashes of stock and gravy, wine, sherry and Madeira, jammy thumb prints, crusty splodges where egg yolk or crepe batter had spattered and dried in, smears where the ink had been smudged from instructions rubbed out in the moist heat of a kitchen and new ones written, spots where melted chocolate, icings, fruits purees, butter and oils had left their mark, and stray dust from flour, sugars and ground almonds lay in the crevasses and folds of the pages.

This book sat for a few years on a shelf in the kitchen of a certain establishment... which shall remain nameless...and although it was consulted by various employees as if it were the bible, it always remained where it was, until one day it just wasn't there when I went to  take it down.
Whether the book had been pilfered on purpose or it had met an accidental demise I will never know, because nobody in that kitchen ever admitted to or even hinted at what might have happened....I have never witnessed 8 grown men be so silent since!

That was 19 years ago and I still remember that book with fondness, it was my first after all. I can only hope that it is still out there somewhere being useful, the thought of such a treasure being lost for all time....we''ll lets just not go there!

Of course I started a new one as quickly as possible and now I have at least 6 books filled and more to come....some people hand down their diaries to their children or grandchildren....I will hand down my recipe books.

Although in the aftermath of the disappearance I jotted down as many of my original recipes as I could remember off the top of my head, and I still have them, there are those that are lost to me forever... for example.... the cheesiest and lightest of truffled cheese souffles that rose every time without fail, that perfectly smooth chicken and duck liver pate, that watercress essence I have never been able to duplicate, a seafood terrine where the jelly was as clear as glass and as flavourful as a broth....and most heart rending of all, a blackcurrant, Cassis and chocolate mousse that sat between layers of a cross between a sponge and a hazelnut and almond meringue.... almost macaroon like, but not quite,.....I could almost weep as I think of it as these are recipes that are as useful today as they were in the 90's.

But we can't rewrite the past or sob over split bags of flour so now as I am all for making life as easy as possible for enthusiastic cooks and food lovers, I have no problem in passing on knowledge gained from years at the stove....though my recipes books no longer leave my house!

One recipe that survived was my Perfectly Sweet, Sweet Pastry, a rich and delicate...but not too delicate pastry, that works well as a flan or pie crust and which you can also use as for biscuits.
It keeps well in the fridge for a good week which coming up to Christmas is very handy as if you have some on hand you can whip up a batch of mince pies in a flash if you have unexpected guests! The paste also freezes and defrosts as if it were freshly made.

If you want a fine pastry or for using as biscuits then choose icing sugar for your mix.....for a crisper pastry case or for say making an enclosed apple pie, then use castor sugar.
If you wish to make biscuits you can replace the egg with 2 egg yolks...this makes it really rich and yummy.....you can use other extracts too such as lemon, orange, almond or even rose water.
Please don't be tempted to use artificial flavourings, there is no comparison.
This paste is best made using your hands...it may seem fiddly and messy but you could mix the dough with a fork to begin with and then get in with your hands.

You will need: 

250 g plain flour
30 g finely ground almonds
100 g icing sugar or castor sugar
pinch fine salt
140 g unsalted butter
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 medium egg...chilled

How to:

  • sieve the flour then add the almonds making sure there are no lumps, set aside
  • beat the egg and set aside ready to use
  • have the butter at room temperature and place in a mixing bowl...or if you want to do it in the classic manner, you can make your paste on a marble slab or work surface
  • sieve the icing sugar then add with the vanilla extract to the butter
  • you can use an electric mixer for this next part...I certainly do!......cream the butter and icing sugar on a slow to medium speed until well softened and combined....don't be tempted to mix it on a fast speed, we don't want to beat air into the pastry, we just want to save your arm muscles!
  • do use your hands for this next bit or else keep the mixer very slow and then use your hands once the dough begins to form if you don't like your hands messy.....
  • once the butter is creamed....add the egg and mix again, then add the flour and almonds and work gently until a ball of dough begins to form
  • turn out onto a very lightly floured surface and mould gently until smooth
  • place the paste in a plastic bag, or in a bowl which you must cover with cling film, and chill in the refrigerator at least 2 hours or until needed
You could cheat you know by throwing everything in a food processor and blitzing it until the ball of pastry forms....but don't tell anyone I said that! 




Use this paste to line a tart tin!


or make some delectable jam tarts.....with homemade jam that is!


I used mine to make the shells for these delightful frangipan pear tarts......recipe to follow shortly!



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