Puff pastry weekend (3/3 - Bouchees with chanterelle-sole filling and poached eggs)

This is a great recipe for a Sunday breakfast or part of a dinner menu. Really fast and easy, when you have the dough ready.

Bouchees with chanterelle-sole filling and poached eggs

Ingredients:

• half of the puff pastry recipe
• eggwash (1 medium egg yolk mixed with 1 tbsp milk)
• 120g butter
• 250g chanterelles
• 1 shallot, chopped
• 1  sole, about 600g, filleted and skinned
• juice of 1 lemon
• 30g Italian parsley, snipped
• salt and freshly ground pepper

Preparation:

1. Roll out the dough, 3mm thick. Cut out eight 9-cm disks. Transfer to a baking sheet lined with waxed paper. Chill for half an hour.
2. Arrange four dough disks on a baking sheet and brush with eggwash. Cut 7-cm disks out of remaining disk, so you end up with rings. Put rings on whole disk and press lightly to adhere. Brush with eggwash. 
3. Prick the center of the bouchees and bake for about 20 minutes at an oven pre-heated to 190 C. Cool.
4. Meanwhile prepare the filling: heat 40g butter in a skillet and cook chanterelles over medium heat, about 8-10 minutes. Add the shallot and season to taste. Keep warm.
5. Cut the sole fillets into 1-cm strips.Heat the remaining butter in skillet, until foaming. Add the sole and cook for a few minutes, until done. Add lemon juice, mushrooms and parsley, mix well.
6. Fill bouchees with the filling and serve at once.

Puff pastry weekend (2/3 - puff cookies with anything)

Continuation of puff pastry weekend - this post includes some suggestions for what to put on or inside the dough :)

Cookies topped with fresh fruits

Ingredients:

• Puff pastry dough
• Various fruits  (apples, bananas, peaches, mango, melons...)

Preparation:

1. Take the dough out of the fridge and roll out on the lightly floured counter to about 5mm thickness.
   

   

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2. Cut out desired forms, transfer to a baking sheet and refrigerate for half an hour.
   

   

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3. Cut the fruit into thick slices and arrange on puff dough.
   
   
4. Bake until golden in an oven preheated to 190-200 C, about 15 minutes.
   
   

Filled puff pastry cookies

Preparation:
You will also need some lightly beaten egg for spreading over the dough.

1. Take the dough out of the fridge and roll out on the lightly floured counter to about 5mm thickness. 
2. Cut out 5x10 cm rectangles.
   
   
3. Put the filling on one part of the dough.
4. Spread the egg on the edge of the dough and fold it over the filling. Press lightly.
   
   

   

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5. Transfer ready cookies on the baking sheet and refrigerate for half an hour.
   
   
6. Brush with eggwash.
   
   
7. Bake until golden in an oven preheated to 190-200 C, about 15 minutes.
   
   

Those can be sweet or savory, possibilities are endless.

Sweet suggestions:

• Chocolate
  
  
  
  
  
• Jam
• Fruits

Savory suggestions:

• Brie or camembert cheese
  
  
• Sausage with hoisin or barbecue sauce
  
  
• Minced meat
• Oriental vegetables

Puff pastry weekend (Part 1/3: Dough)

Here is a recipe for something that probably most of you are used to buying frozen at local supermarket. It's convenient, fast and it works. But you certainly won't get same results as with the real stuff. Sure, it's time-consuming and you have to plan ahead. But imagine serving someone that stuff, fresh out of the oven! This is a recipe from the probably most well-known cookbook of all-time - "Joy of Cooking". It simplifies initial step a bit, by introducing food processor, thus the recipe name. After that you will find some suggestions on using that base. It is indeed an idea to spend whole weekend in the kitchen :) (just joking, while it takes a lot of time to make that recipe, the actual time you spend in the kitchen is not so big)

Food-processor puff pastry

Makes over 1kg

Ingredients:

•  3 1/3 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 1/4 teaspoons salt
• 3/4 cup ice water
• ~475g cold unstalted butter

Preparation:

1. Pulse 2 1/3 cups all-purpose flour with the salt in food processor. Scatter over 75g (5 tbsps) cold butter, cubed. 
2. Pulse until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs. Drizzle over the ice water. Pulse a bit longer, until dough comes together, 10-15 seconds. 
3. Scrape the dough onto a sheet of plastic wrap and form it into 15 cm square. Wrap and refrigerate for an hour.
4. Cut remaining butter into 1cm slices and freeze for a moment.
5. Place remaining 1 cup flour in the food processor and distribute butter over it. Pulse until it resembles coarse gravel, scrape the walls and continue processing, until smooth. 
6. Scrape out and shape into square about 2 cm bigger than the dough. Refrigerate.
7. Place the dough square on a lightly floured surface and roll into about 30x20cm rectangle, with shorter side facing you. Unwrap the butter package and center it on one half of the dough. Fold the dough over the butter, completely covering it. Press the dough together on the 3 open sides. 
8. Turn the dough so that the folded edge is on the left. Roll the dough into a 28x18cm rectangle, keeping a short side facing you. Fold the bottom third of the dough over the center of the dough. Fold the top third of the dough on top of the bottom third. Rotate the dough so that the folded edge is on  the left and roll the dough once more into a rectangle, same size as before. This time fold the bottom end up and the opt end down to meet in the center ( do not overlap), then fold the dough in half, to make 4 layers of the dough. This double fold is the second turn. Wrap the dough and refrigerate for 45 minutes.
9. With the folded edge on the left, roll the dough out again to 28x18cm rectangle. Make another double fold, wrap the dough and refrigerate for 45 minutes.
10. Roll the dough our and make another double fold for the fourth turn. Wrap and refrigerate for at least 1 hour before using.