Today we’re going to be talking about puff pastry. Puff pastry is that flaky light, airy pastry which is made by folding and rolling dough with lots of layers. The butter is folded in, and then it’s folded in half again and rolled with a rolling pin. It’s a real crowd pleaser because it’s delicious and it’s so easy to use for quick appetizers and elegant desserts. It’s very distinctive as far as pastry goes because of its light, flaky texture. You get crescent roll pastry, and you get philo pastry, but puff pastry is the best kind to buy because it’s so delicious. It’s good to buy all butter puff pastry, which is much healthier than the margarine kind.
So, today I’m going to tell you the history of puff pastry, and then give you some ideas of what you can cook with it. It’s very easy to use, and a great way to make something fast. I know Trader Joe’s has an all butter puff pastry.
Puff pastry dates back to many centuries ago. It’s mostly of European and Mediterranean origin, with a bit of Middle East. Ancient Egypt, Greece, and Rome did an early version of a layered dough. It wasn’t as refined as modern puff pastry because their tools were different, and they used oil instead of butter, so it didn’t puff quite as much as we know today.
Philo pastry was used in the Middle East in Turkish and Greek cooking, and it still is today. Philo pastry also has layers, it’s individual pieces that are layered. You’d use three or four pieces of philo with some oil in between, and then put your filling inside, whereas with puff pastry, you use a single sheet and that puffs up because it’s already been layered when it was folded and rolled.
Claudius Gele is credited with inventing puff pastry in the 1600s. The story goes that he was attempting to make a type of bread for his father who was ill, and he accidentally created the puffing effect by encasing butter between layers of dough. France had a central role in creating this pastry and refining it.
A French chef who was the author of Le Cuisinier Francois is one of the first who describes something resembling puff pastry in writing. So, France became the hub of puff pastry and its techniques – layering the dough and the butter. The technique was perfected and it became very well known in haute cuisine – high cuisine. It was used in both savory and sweet dishes.
Characteristics of puff pastry are the folding of the layers of dough and the butter repeatedly, and then it’s leavened with steam. The puff is created by steam from the butter and moisture in the dough. That’s why you need a really hot oven to puff it up when you bake it. There’s no yeast or leaven of any kind in it. Also, it’s quite labor intensive. The dough is folded and rolled multiple times, usually six times to produce those hundreds of thin layers that are going to puff up. It relies on its moisture and its fat content to make it effective.
Puff pastry is used in everything from fast food items like turnovers to gourmet desserts. Nowadays you can buy it frozen. I like to buy the kind that’s packaged flat. It has two sheets of puff pastry that you can just defrost a little bit and then roll out. I find that the one that’s rolled often cracks when it’s defrosting. You have to make sure to defrost it really well before you try and flatten it. Otherwise it can. Crack or just not be as effective.
One of our favorite easy things to make with puff pastry is what we call puff pastry tarts. Basically, you take a piece of puff pastry and cut it into nine or maybe twelve square pieces. Then you put those into a shallow muffin tray, maybe with a little bit of grease. Then on top, you can put some steamed butternut and feta with a bit of rosemary, or some cherry tomatoes sliced in half with a bit of mozzarella or again, feta, a bit of rosemary or oregano, and some salt. Then you put them in a really hot oven, probably a little bit over 200 Celsius or 400 Fahrenheit. If you put it in there for about 10 minutes, it puffs up nicely, and it makes an amazing little appetizer you can try.
Then for dessert, you can just take another piece of puff pastry, use a pastry brush to put some butter on, and sprinkle it with cinnamon sugar and bake it. It’s a great little easy dessert.
Here are some other things you can do with puff pastry. Cheese straws are a great one. You can do a variety of flavors of them. You take one little strip of puff pastry and put something like basil pesto or tomato paste on there, and then some cheese. Then you put another piece of pastry on top, twist them into little turns, and then bake them until they’re golden. Those are amazing little cheese straws that you can try to make.
Puff pastry is great as a base for tarts or quiches. It’s a good idea probably to bake the pastry a little bit first until it’s mostly done, and then put the filling in, because otherwise especially that underneath part won’t be very nice.
There are things like sausage rolls – those are a British thing. You wrap puff pastry around some kind of sausage meat that’s been well seasoned. You can even take some sausages in their casing, cut them open along the side, and then take out the filling. Maybe you can check if they need any more seasoning by frying up a little bit of the meat and tasting it. Then, when it’s ready, just put it in a roll shape, roll the puff pastry around it, and bake it.
You can try making the famous or infamous beef wellington, Gordon Ramsay style. You use puff pastry to wrap a beef fillet or beef tenderloin, which is coated with some sort of mushroom puree and some prosciutto. Then you wrap the puff pastry around the outside, and it makes a luxurious main course. To make empanadas, you fill puff pastry with meats, vegetables, or even cheese. It’s like a little handheld pie. You can also put caramelized onions and olives on top or inside. If you just use puff pastry as a base or as a wrap that you fill, it’s really easy to just be creative. Before, we’ve cooked ground beef or mince with cheese, and then wrapped that in puff pastry to make a little pie.
You can also use it for sweet dishes like apple turnovers. You fill a square of puff pastry with spiced apple slices, and then you seal and bake it. This is similar to the mince pie, but just a sweet dessert. You should add some cinnamon in there. For elephant ears, you sprinkle cinnamon and sugar on the puff pastry, roll it into a heart shape, and then bake it until it’s caramelized.
To make fruit tarts, you top your puff pastry with pastry cream and fresh fruits like berries or peaches. Napoleon is when you layer baked pieces of puff pastry with custard, whipped cream and maybe berries, and then you chop it and dust it with icing sugar. You can do a puff pastry version of cinnamon rolls. Spread the pastry with melted butter, sugar, and cinnamon, and then roll, slice, and bake. They don’t need to rise, and it’ll be a quick version of a cinnamon roll.
To make jam puffs, you put a small amount of jam onto a puff pastry square and then fold and bake it, or you can even leave it open. For churros, you can pipe strips of puff pastry dough into hot oil, and then fry or bake them and dust them with sugar. That’s a cheat churro.
Puff pastry pizza would be very different to normal pizza, but delicious. You can spread your tomato paste or sauce and then add your cheese and your toppings to a puff pastry sheet. Then bake it for a quick pizza that doesn’t need to rise. For pinwheels, you spread fillings like ham and cheese or spinach and feta on the puff pastry, and then you roll up, slice it, and bake it. Baked brie is delicious, and you can wrap a wheel of brie in puff pastry, and bake that. You could add jam or nuts on top. Bake it until the cheese is gooey and the pastry is crisp.
When you’re working with puff pastry, it’s a good idea to keep it cold. Let it defrost, but not too much, because working with chilled puff pastry helps to maintain its layers. You just put it back in the fridge if it gets too soft. Adding an egg wash is also helpful, because it makes it golden, glossy, and crispy. Lightly scoring the edges or pricking the base makes it not puff up too much when you don’t want it to. As I mentioned, bake it at high heat to ensure the layers rise and crisp up.
Here’s a fun idea. Take a couple of muffin trays and make little puff pastry cups in the muffin places. Score or prick the bottom of those a little so that they don’t puff up too much in the oven. This makes little baked cups, and then you can fill them with chocolate mousse, ice cream, or fruit and cream. It’s delicious to be able to eat your cup at the end.
Lastly, another delicious way to use puff pastry is to make a wreath for Christmas time, or some other kind of holiday wreath. Shape the puff pastry into a circle, and place your fillings all the way around the edge in a thin ring. Then you cut the center diagonally in a few places, like little pizza slices, up to the place where your filling starts, and flap those over outwards. There will be little gaps, but it’s basically a covered wreath with some kind of filling. You can use pine nuts and goats’ cheese, or ricotta with jam – something delicious like that.
These are just some fun ideas. Maybe you have your own ways of using puff pastry. It’s just such a great pastry for when you want something quickly. It’s great for if you need a party appetizer, or if someone’s coming over and you want to add something elegant to the meal. It’s really easy to make dishes look good and the taste is amazing. You can put basically anything with puff pastry and it’ll taste good. Just remember to cook it at a hot temperature so that it puffs up, and to season whatever you put on there. Especially if it’s something like ricotta or butternut, it needs salt, or you can add feta to add that salty flavor.
