Puff Pastry (Puff the Magic Pastry)

Most of today's class time was dedicated to making puff pastry dough. It is a three step process: make the dough (detrempe), the butter compound (beurrage) and then put it together in a package (paton) to roll and fold.

The dough is a mix of AP and cake flour, a littler salt and sugar, ice water and a small amount of butter. First, the butter must be cut up into small pieces and rubbed into the dry ingredients so there is no bits left, then the water added in a well and folded in -- folded, not kneaded, to avoid gluten formation which will make the final product tough.

Separately, the solid butter is beaten with a bit of flour to soften; with just the right consistency, it can be rolled without too much resistance or breaking. The dough is rolled out into the shape of a big plus sign (+), the squared butter placed in the middle, then the flaps folded over. This package is flipped seam-side down, then rolled out long until thin. Then it's folded (far ends to the middle), then folded in half so that it looks like a book. This is done twice, then put in the fridge to harden, then done twice more. That's 3 original layers times 4 (12) times 4 (48) times 4 (192) times 4 (768 layers!) in the one-half inch thick dough. Crazy.

Tomorrow we cook all sorts of stuff with the pastry, but for the last 30 minutes of the class, Chef G melted some chocolate and we used our cornets (folded pieces of parchment) to write "Happy Birthday" and various things. As Chef G said, if you didn't pay attention in 1st grade to get your script writing together, it's certainly not going to help now. The chocolate itself was 'compound chocolate', which is made with additional vegetable oil so it doesn't need to be tempered properly. It tasted like cheap chocolate, like bad Valentine's Day chocolates or old Hannukah gelt.

Tomorrow, Apple Strips, Palmiers, Paillettes, and other forms of puff pastry

ADDENDA:

BREAKFAST: 6:30am, good granola, good milk, 1 bowl, hunger 4/5

Woke up a little hungry.

AM NIBBLES: 10-11:30am, a hunk of french bread, a few small mouthfuls of piping chocolate, .25 bowl, hunger 4/5

LUNCH: 12:30pm, half a pastrami sandwich, pea soup, coleslaw, 2 pickles, water, 2 bowl, hunger 4/5

Comfort food at the 2nd Ave Deli.

PM SNACK: 2:30pm, weird Chinese fruit

On the Circle Line with Y and her parents. They offered me a weird fruit I could not say no to. Kind of like a very large tough-skinned grape that had to be peeled, with a small pit. Very juicy and sweet.

PM WATERING: 6pm, 2 quarts ice water

PM SNACK: 7pm, small cherry icee, .5 bowl, hunger 4/5
At the movies. 213 calories; the only other size was double the calories, but only 50 cents more, he he. If it wasn't for that listing, I definitely would have gone for the bigger one.

DINNER: 9:30pm, 2 slices bad streetza, 1.5 bowl, hunger 4/5