Easy Rough Puff Pastry

Who doesn’t love a beautiful buttery flakey puff pastry?  But if you have ever looked at making true puff pastry you can pretty much set aside at least half a day if not more, and that is great if you have the time.

But for those of us who just don’t have or don’t want to dedicate that much time to pastry,  there is another option other than store brought.

It’s call Rough Puff Pastry and takes on about 30 minutes from start to finish and tastes delicious, so much more flavour than any supermarket puff pastry.

The key with puff pastry is to create MANY layers by folding and re rolling numerous times, sounds like a pain the ***, but really it only takes 15-20 minutes of rolling to create a beautiful puff pastry and the extra effort is certainly worth it.

I found the way to make this SO MUCH QUICKER, was to place my butter in the freezer overnight and then grate 3/4 of the butter into the flour and then grate the remaining butter on every layer as I folded and then re rolled.  This helped create beautiful layers of buttery pastry.

I adapted this from a Gordon Ramsey recipe, I have used half the amount of butter that he does, but feel free to double the butter if making pastry for sweet items.

I didn’t need to use a food processor and I did not have to spend any time getting the butter incorporated with the flour as it was grated, it just mixed in beautifully.

Gradually add your water until you have a dough that will hold together, but is not sticky.  I then wrapped the ball in cling film and put in the fridge while I washed the bowl and scales.

I then roll out into a large rectangle, grate more frozen butter over entire surface, then fold up bottom third of pastry and then fold top third over that, (as it folding a letter).
Turn the pastry a quarter of a turn and roll out into a rectangle again, grate more frozen butter over surface and fold as before.
Repeat this pattern until all your butter is used up, cover with cling film and place in the fridge for at least an hour before using.

Another way to ensure that your pastry puffs up nicely is to make sure you have our oven at around 200C/400F it’s the high temperature that creates steam and that is what causes your pastry to puff up.

Will keep wrapped in the fridge for 2 days and in the freezer for about a month.

Easy Rough Puff Pastry

 

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Prep time

20 mins

Total time

20 mins

 

Serves: 500grams

Ingredients

• 250g plain flour
• 125 grams butter (freeze overnight)
• ⅔ cup very cold water (add in small increments you may not need to use it all)

Instructions

1. Freeze your butter overnight
2. Sift your flour into a large bowl
3. Grate into the flour, ¾ of the frozen butter (Keep remaining butter in freezer)
4. mix together (I just use a spoon)
5. Add small amounts of water and mix until dough holds together but is still floury
6. Place in fridge for around 10 -20 minutes
7. roll out into a large rectangle, grate more frozen butter over entire surface
8. Fold up bottom third of pastry and then fold top third over that, (as it folding a letter)
9. turn the pastry a quarter of a turn and roll out into a rectangle again, grate more frozen butter over surface and fold as before.
10. Repeat this patter until all your butter is used up
11. cover with cling film and place in the fridge for at least an hour before using
12. Bake at 204C/400F when ready to bake

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