This recipe is based on Rose Levy Berenbaum’s excellent All Occasion Downy Yellow Butter Cake, adapted slightly to my own tastes and techniques. Yellow Butter Cake 6 large egg yolks 1 cup milk 2 teaspoons vanilla 13 1/2 ounces (3 cups) cake flour, sifted 10 1/2 ounces (1 1/2 cups) sugar 1 tablespoon plus 1 […]
READ ONLet’s get the word out there on the table right now: panis. Because that’s what I’ll be discussing this morning. I know, several of you sniggered yesterday at the word “coctum”, probably the same bunch that were chuckling at my pasties when I made them. I know you back-of-the-bus types, out to ruin everything that’s […]
READ ONTop-crimped, steak and leek, that is. I’ll stick to the shaping instructions, since the dough mixing technique is almost identical to that for side-crimped pasties. We’ll pick up at the point where you’ve assembled your ingredient mound — salted at every layer of course — running right down the middle of your dough circle. Paint […]
READ ONI decided I’d stretch out a bit for the top-crimped version, and do a steak & leek treatment on the concept. It’s still within the boundaries of traditional, assuming that word has much meaning. For as you know well by now, pasties were a make-do food. Anything and everything can — and did — go […]
READ ONIs it filled with chiles, black beans and rice? I honestly don’t know. However I do know that in a town in the south of Mexico known as Pachuca, they make and serve hand pies they call pasties. They are, of course, another product of Cornish emigration, brought there by miners who weren’t after tin, […]
READ ON…side-crimped, glazed, with sliced potatoes and pork, that is. Top-crimped steak pasties coming soon. So then, let’s start with the dough, which is a very elementary proposition, even for those who fear pie crust. Begin by whisking your flour and salt together. Add your fat… …and work it in by hand until you get a […]
READ ONThis dough is a slightly wetter version of the dough that I use for top-crimped pasties. But either one is very wet compared to pie dough of the kind you bake in a pan. That extra toughness is of course what allows the pasty to maintain its shape without the help of a mold. So, […]
READ ONHigh ratio flour is used almost exclusively by professional cake bakers, though it’s also found in store bought cake mixes. What makes this type of flour special is that it’s ground very finely and treated with either heat or chlorine (or both). What does that do? It allows the flour to disperse very, very evenly […]
READ ONThis recipe is taken from Peter Reinhart’s The Bread Baker’s Apprentice, an outstanding book that I recommend to all. This dough needs an overnight rest. Basically you mix it in the evening, rush it into the fridge until the next day, let it rise 2 to 3 hours, then shape the loaves and bake. Quite […]
READ ONSometimes I think God put puff pastry on Earth for one reason and one reason alone: so it could be made into scraps and those scraps turned into Alsatian onion tart. This appetizer is so rich and lovely — covered with caramelized onions, cream and bacon — odds are excellent your dinner guests won’t ever […]
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