A flour by any other number… (Danish pastries)

A couple of weeks ago I saw a recipe for Danish pastries which I thought interesting. The recipe states that you should use 00 flour to make them. I’ve never seen 00 flour here in normal supermarkets (you can check the packet. Sometimes it says the type – I found types 45 and 65, which are your normal flours. More often than not, it doesn’t give the type). So, all in the name of research, I invested in two flours and made two batches of pastries, one using ‘patisserie’ and the other using ‘pain’ (pastry and bread). I had a quick look at the ingredients in the flours. The bread flour contained a mixture of different types of flour, including wheat, bean (? ‘fève’, which is a pulse) and soya, whereas the pastry flour contained only wheat flour.

I made the pastries over a day, starting on Friday evening and finishing on Saturday afternoon. I did the second roll-fold-and-chill on Saturday morning and the third on Saturday lunchtime. There is no kneading involved, so it is less labour intensive than bread (which I also made this weekend). 

Danish pastries

For the starter
1 cube of fresh yeast (the original recipe used dried yeast, but fresh yeast is widely available here, and I find it easier to use)

75ml warm water
50g of your chosen flour

For the dough
75ml cold milk
2 egg yolks
50ml cold cream
25g caster sugar
250g cold unsalted butter, cut into 1-2cm cubes
300g of your chosen flour, plus extra for rolling
1 tsp salt
Beaten egg, to finish

For the starter, in a warm bowl dissolve the yeast in the warm water, beat in the flour until smooth, cover and leave for an hour to bubble. I covered the starter and then the dough with a damp tea towel. This prevents the dough from forming a skin on top.

Make the dough by whisking the milk, egg yolks, cream and sugar into the starter, followed first by the butter cubes and then by the flour and salt. Stir everything together to a rough, lumpy dough, scoop it out on to a floured worktop and roll out to 1cm thick. Fold it in by thirds, roll it out again as before, fold it in by thirds again, then wrap and chill for 30 minutes. Repeat this rolling and chilling sequence twice more, then roll and shape as needed. So, this is after the third rolling. Can you spot the difference?

Danish pastry dough, pastry flour on the left; bread flour on the right

For raisin danish
Roll a piece of dough to 30cm x 15cm x 1cm thick. Brush the surface with water (or spread with a thin layer of custard) and generously dot with plump, dark raisins. Roll tightly up along the length, so you have a short, fat scroll, seal the end with water, then cut into four wheels.

Alternative: roll a piece of marzipan out to about 30x12x1 and place this on top of the dough. Sprinkle with raisins and continue as above. Or sprinkle the dough with chocolate chips.

I made one lot of raisin (pastry flour) and one lot of dried cranberries (using the bread flour).

Raw Danish pastries, with dried cranberries

and filled with raisins

Rising and baking

Line a baking tray with nonstick paper, put the prepared pastries on top, cover loosely with clingfilm, and leave the shaped dough to rise somewhere warm until almost doubled in size. Once risen, brush with beaten egg and bake at 200C for 10 minutes. Lower the heat to 180C and bake for another 15-20 minutes, until crisp.

Cranberry Danishes

Raisin Danishes

Verdict? Well, once you get over the amount of butter in these, they are divine! Buttery, crumbly, flaky, light… OMG. I got about 24 Danishes from the two lots (ie: 12 pastries per lot), and I can’t wait for another excuse to eat another one.

And for the difference between the flours? None really that I can see. Both raised well, they both taste the same (I might have to have another two to check that though), both were easy to use… I have photos, so I’ll get them up asap so that you can decide for yourselves.

Next time, I would use a little less butter – only about 10-20 grams less.


Update: I found this site: http://cooking-ez.com/page.php?id=12 with an explanation about flours. Seems that in French speaking countries, they have their own system for classifying them! Now, at the moment (24.03.12/19.02), I am no closer to uncovering what type 00 is 'in French' but the nice Jean-Hugues of the former site has a list of what French flours can be used to make which goodies. Unfortunately, he doesn't mention which corresponds to the Italian 00. It could be T45, but I'm going to investigate further. Also, to further complicate matters, the flour I used in my baking this weekend doesn't list the type it is!
Someone contacted me to say that you can buy 00 four in the GB at Place Jourdan, but that it is quite expensive.

Chicken and leek pie

Looking for something easy of a Sunday evening (oi, no sniggering at the back there!), I decided to try to the Hairy Biker’s chicken and leek pie from the October 2011 edition of the Good Food magazine.

It’s been about (counts on fingers) 20 years since I made pastry, at my mammy’s knee. Nothing’s changed in pastry making in that time. So, for the pastry…

350g flour

200g butter

1 egg

A glass of water, with a spoon

Either tip the flour and butter into the food processer and blitz or in a bowl, rub the butter into the flour until it all looks like breadcrumbs. Add the beaten egg and mix. Add the water a spoonful at a time until it all comes together in a ball.

Pop it onto a plate and cover with cling film.

For the filling, you’ll need:

3 chicken filets

A knob of butter

2 leeks, chopped

Lardons

A few cloves of garlic to taste

About 50g of butter

About 50g flour

About 200ml milk

About 150ml cream

About 200ml stock

Salt and pepper

Poach the chicken in some stock (you’ll probably need more than the 250ml cited above) for about 10-15 mins. Once done, cut them into bite-sized pieces and keep the cooking liquid for the sauce.

While the chicken is cooking, you can get on with the rest of the dish. Melt the knob of butter in a large pot and sweat out the leeks. Cook them for about 5 mins and add the crushed garlic and lardons and cook for another couple of minutes. When done, transfer this to a bowl.

In another saucepan, melt the 50g of butter and then add the flour. Cook this for about 1 minute, stirring constantly. Off the heat, add the milk, bit by bit, stirring until the first bit is incorporated before adding the next bit. Add the stock and bring to the boil to cook through. Pour in the cream and season as you like. Add the chopped up chicken and the leek mixture and stir to combine.

For the fun bit: heat the oven to 200 degrees and line a 23 cm pie dish. Pie dishes seem to be a bit hard to come by in Belgium, so I used a cake tin. It worked perfectly. Let your baking paper hang over the edges - I usually line the bottom with two long, wide pieces of baking paper at right angles to each other and out of the tin to use as handles once it's cooked and a circle of baking paper on top of this.

Divide the pastry into 2/3 + 1/3. Roll the 2/3 out to fit into your dish – including the sides! (about 3-4 millimetres thick). Brush the edges of the pie with beaten egg. Pour in the chicken and leek filling. Roll the 1/3 to fit the top of your dish and lay this across. Press to seal the edges and brush the top with the rest of the beaten egg. Make a hole in the centre to let out the steam, and pop into your oven for about 35-40 mins.

Once cooked, let it cool for a good bit before eating (cooling it also makes it easier to remove from the cake tin). We ate this au natural with a bottle of good beer to wash it down.

Variations: I omitted the lardons and replaced them with some left over carrot and peas. You could also add a spoonful of your favourite mustard to the sauce once it’s cooked. A couple of tarragon leaves or other herbs such as parsley or chives mightn’t go amiss either. The leeks are changeable too with whatever veg you have around, such as spinach (make sure it’s very well dried first) or mushrooms.