Lesson 16 - 17 : Savoury Puff Pastry

Puff Pastry : A rich, delicate, multilayered pastry achieved by placing pats of chilled butter on the top of pastry dough, rolling it out, folding it in thirds, and letting it rest. This process is repeated about 6 times, producing a pastry with many layers of dough and butter. When baked, the dough puffs into many separate flaky layers.

There were 3 methods of Puff pastry demonstrated by Chef Keith; French, English and Scotch...We do just French and English in our kitchen and cooked the beef bourguignon filling for 2nd day...

...So for the 1st day..we got nothing to take home....(and was really hungry ^^'')

Chef Keith showed the French method of doing Puff pastry...

For 2nd day, we had so many food to taste: Chicken Vol au Vents, Beef Bourguignon Pie, Salmon en croute (Salmon Pie) and Vegetable parcels...all baked by chef Karin.

Chicken Vol au vents...so yummy...I took a small one in one bite :D

Beef Bourguignon Pie..

Chef Karin's Salmon Pie...so funny

Vegetable parcels (veggies with cream sauce)

Due to the time limitation again, we did just beef pie, empty vol au vents and fish pie...At first, we cooked th salmon filling and cool it in fridge, then rolled out our puff pastry...so had, my arms were a bit tried from yesterday...

The baking temperature also very important...If the oven is too hot, the pastry will develop wildly or not at all, as the sides are baked too quickly, hindering any development. The pastry will then be fully coloured before it is baked through properly, which is most undesirable.

If the temperature is too low, the fat will run out and the pastry will hardly lift.

So the temperature should be around 210c for the thicker pieces and those with a filling and 220c for flat thick pieces.

My Salmon en croute...(its mouth was too small, u can't see)

The front one is my beef bourguignon pie...I really think it looks nice...(behind is Su jin's)

My vol au vents: Chef Karin said that they were not high enough because I rolled it out too thin...

All my puff, after came out from the oven...soooo much melted butter on the tray...I asked Chef Karin, Ping (my friend) and Chef Michael on 3rd day...they said my lamination was not good enough...

However, my puff were soooo yummy and crispy (even can't compare with chef's products..haha)