Minced Lamb in Puff Pastry and Roasted Vegetables

Minced lamb in puff pastry served with roasted vegetables & potatoes

Crispy on the outside, juicy on the inside

Roasted pumpkin and cauliflower

Sausages in puff pastry

Cream Puffs for the Ladies

First of all, YAY.. I see improvements in my cream puffs! *grins*. Last Saturday, Kim and I made cream puffs for GROW‘s Women Fellowship. It was Kim’s first attempt. She enjoyed pipping the pastry and filling the custard filling into the baked pastry. The cream puffs turned out well (better than the ones I tried at home) although Kim just estimated the weight for all the ingredients as she doesn’t have a weighing scale. Good job Kim 😀

Croissant and Danish Pastries

“1..2..3..4..5..6..7..8..9..10..11..12..13..14..15..16..17..18..19..20.. Into the fridge. Fast! Fast!” Wow, I didn’t know that making danish pastry isn’t easy. You must work under a cool temperature and all the ingredients have to be cold. And you need to work fast, especially in rolling out the dough. Roll out only for about 20 seconds and rest it in the fridge for about 5 to 10 minutes. Then roll out again and rest again. We repeated that process for 3 times before cutting the dough into shapes. It’s a great experience anyway though I don’t fancy danish pastry because of its flakiness which causes a lot of mess when eating it. Haha.

Croissants

Danish pastry with custard filling

Cinnamon bun (California version)

Mini Cream Puffs

Cream puffs are made from choux pastry recipe. It is easy to make and it does not require a lot of tools. My mini cream puffs are really mini. I expected it to be slightly bigger but anyway, minis are cute, aren’t they? Just one bite and it’s gone. Haha. I am glad Papa likes it. I will try to make bigger ones next time and perhaps with different flavours too.

My one-bite-size cream puff

Custard filling

Puff Pastry Variations

From the basic puff pastry recipe, you can make chicken pie, curry puffs, matchsticks, cream horn, custard slice and many more depending on your creativity.

Chicken pie

Mini chicken pie

Cream horn

Curry puff

Custard slice

The custard filling is too watery

Matchsticks

Puff Pastry

Puff pastry, also called ‘water dough’ is made up of flour, butter & pastry margarine, cold water and some vinegar. The process of making it can be time consuming as you need to roll out and fold the dough several times and you must allow it to rest in between folds. From the basic puff pastry, you can turn it into many kinds of snacks whether savoury or sweet ones. Today we made sardine puffs, cheese sticks and sweet piggy ears.

Various creation from puff pastry

Mini sardine puff

Cheese sticks

Sweet piggy ears

PUFF PASTRY RECIPE

250gm flour

130gm ice water

15gm butter

1 tbsp vinegar

200gm pastry margarine (for folding)

METHOD

1. Mix flour and salt in a mixing bowl.

2. Slowly pour in ice water and vinegar and mix well.

3. Continue mixing for about 5 minutes until dough is smooth and elastic.

4. Wrap in plastic and allow dough to rest for 10 minutes. Meanwhile, soften pastry margarine with hands and shape into a square.

6. Take out dough and roll out to fit the pastry margarine.

7. Place pastry margarine onto dough and fold in the edges.

8. Roll out dough well.

9. Give it a single fold and wrap in plastic to rest for 5 minutes.

8. Remove plastic. Roll out dough and give it double fold and wrap in plastic to rest for 5 minutes.

9. Repeat step 8 and 9 for twice.

11. The dough is ready to roll out and use.

12. Roll out well (not too thick or too thin) and cut into required shapes.

13. Bake at 220 degrees C for about 20 minutes.

TIPS

It is important to keep the dough cold when you are working. If the butter begins to soften, put the dough into the freezer for 10-20 minutes, then resume your work.

Try not to over-handle the dough. Work as quickly as you reasonably can.

Choux Pastry

Choux pastry (a French word pronounced as ‘shoe pastry’) is a light pastry dough which is used to make cream puff, eclair, churro and beignets. It is made from butter, water, flour, and eggs. Choux pastry is usually baked but for churros and beignets, they are fried.

CHOUX PASTRY INGREDIENTS

100g water

40g butter

60g flour

1 egg (app. 50g)

METHOD

Bring water and butter to boil (boiling point).

Remove from the heat.

Pour in the flour and stir well under a low heat till you get a dough.

Turn off the heat and allow the dough to cool (about 3 -4 minutes).

Add in beaten eggs at intervals.

Keep stirring until you get the right consistency (not to firm nor too watery).

When it is ready, fill it into pipping bags.

Pipe out into small dough. Make sure you leave more gap in between each dough because they will expand (double the size) when baked.

Choux pastry for cream puff

Bake at 200 degree C for 20-30 minutes.

Baked puffs

CUSTARD FILLING

Bring butter, 3/4 of the milk and sugar to boil.

Stir the remaining milk into custard powder.

When the milk boils, pour in the custard mixture and stir well to get a smooth custard.

If you are not using the custard yet, place a small piece of butter on the custard and close it with a plastic sheet to prevent it from drying.

Cream puff topped with chocolate

Swan cream puff

Tuna filling puff

To make churros, pipe choux pastry into strips on greaseproof paper.

Choux pastry for churros

Heat up oil for deep drying.

When oil is ready, place the choux pastry with the paper side up.

Frying churros

Remove paper and fry until golden brown.

Once it is golden brown, drain thoroughly.

Churros

Before serving, dust with icing sugar or you can also dip them into honey.

Churros with icing sugar

Baked choux pastry