easybreadrecipe.net

Unlike making bread, the dough (détrempe) for croissant and Danish doughs is minimally kneaded to prevent excessive gluten formation. Plenty of gluten development will occur when the butter is rolled in and with the subsequent rolling and folding of the dough. Some bakers like to retard the yeasted détrempe overnight, which improves the extensibility of the gluten network and allows more turns to be done at once. This method is rumored to create the most distinct, flaky layers. Retarding or refrigerating the whole paton (finished dough after butter has been rolled in) overnight will also improve extensibility when rolling out the dough and reduce shrinkage. For both croissant and Danish dough, the détrempe is rolled into a square, and the beurrage is placed in the center of the square, cattycornered. The triangular flaps of dough are folded over the beurrage and pressed together to seal. The paton is given two 3-fold turns and one 4-fold turn, with appropriate rests between. Fewer turns are given to soft-yeasted doughs than puff pastry in order to preserve distinct visible layers.
Fresh yeast is the best choice for these laminates; it works well with cold liquids, with no need for special rehydration in warm water. The dough should be proofed in a warm (80°F), humid environment until it doubles in volume or barely holds a dent when poked. If the dough springs back to the touch, it is underproofed; if it holds a deep dent that does not offer any resistance, it is overproofed. Overproofing results in a product that collapses after baking and has an unpleasantly strong yeasty flavor. Underproofing yields a doughy, unattractive product with fused layers.

Tags: Laminated Bread // Add Comment »

MAKES 2 POUNDS 6 OUNCES DOUGH Also called quick puff pastry, this pastry starts out just like pie dough. Very cold pieces of butter, flour, salt, and ice water are briefly mixed, leaving large, visible chunks of butter. The dough is given its turns immediately. The rapid dough will not rise as high as the classic, but the texture is still flaky and delicate, making it an excellent all-purpose pastry. Slightly more dense than classic puff pastry, it stands up well to savory fillings that tend to be heavy. Napoleons are much easier to cut from rapid puff pastry; when sliced, the layers tend to shatter and crumble less than with classic. Puff pastry scraps are perfect for napoleons, since the dough is docked and weighted to prevent a high rise.

31?3 cups bread flour 4 lb
11?2 tsp salt 1 oz
2 cups unsalted cold butter, cut into 1?2-inch chunks 4 lb
1?2 cup plus 1 Tbs (5 fl oz) ice water 1 lb 4 oz

Large Batch
Combine the flour and salt in a mixer bowl. With the mixer fitted with the paddle and set on lowest speed, add the butter to the flour and salt. Add the ice water in a steady, continuous trickle; continue mixing until the dough just begins to come together. Mix until just barely combined—large pieces of butter should remain. Form into a rough block; chill at least 1 hour. (Pounding the well-floured mass into a shape on a floured surface with a rolling pin minimizes handling.) Roll out into an 8 by 20-inch rectangle. Fold the short ends of the dough inward to meet at the center. Fold the dough at the center as if you were closing a book (4-fold or book turn). Repeat for the second and third turns, rotating the dough package 90 degrees so that when the dough is rolled, the layers of the previous fold now become the short ends of the new rectangle. Refrigerate 1 hour before rolling and shaping.
Puff pastry can be refrigerated three to four days without losing quality. Freeze the assembled products, such as apple turnovers, rather than the whole paton for best results. Thaw filled products in the refrigerator overnight before baking. Unfilled or minimally filled products, such as palmiers or vol-au-vent shells, can be baked directly from the freezer.
For both classic and rapid puff pastry, bake small cookies (palmiers, sacristans) at 425°F, sheet-pan-sized puff pastry for napoleons at 400°F, and large filled tortas at 375°F.

Tags: Bread Recipes 3 // Add Comment »

MAKES 2 POUNDS 11 OUNCES DOUGH
Also called pâte feuilletée, puff pastry is the only dough that achieves its height solely through lamination. Classic puff pastry produces the highest rise of any of the laminates. It is best used in any recipe where the pastry itself must shine. Bouchées and vols-au-vents—pastry shells designed to hold fillings—require the height that can be provided only by classic puff pastry. Elaborate designs can be incised onto the pastry, creating a stunning decorative effect. Pithiviers, a French dessert of a rich almond cream baked between two circles of puff pastry, is decorated in this way. The fruitfilled turnover is another product best made with classic puff pastry.

DOUGH (DÉTREMPE)
3 cups unbleached bread flour 3 lb 8 oz
1?2 cup cake flour 8 oz
11?2 tsp salt 1 oz
1?4 cup unsalted butter, melted 8 oz
11?2 tsp lemon juice 1 oz
3?4 cup _ 2 Tbs (7 fl oz) ice water 1 lb 12 oz
BUTTER (BEURRAGE)
2 cups unsalted butter, cut into 1-inch chunks 4 lb
5 Tbs unbleached bread flour 6 oz

For the dough, combine the flours and salt in a mixer bowl. Using the dough hook and with mixer on low speed, add the butter and lemon juice. Add the ice water in a slow, steady stream, scraping up mixture from the bottom. Add just enough water so that the dough comes together. Increase the speed to medium; knead until smooth and stretchy, about 45 seconds. Form into a rough rectangle; chill 1 hour. For butter mixture, fit mixer with paddle. Add the butter and flour; beat on low speed until smooth and malleable but still cool. Form butter into a block by pounding with a rolling pin on a floured surface. Divide the butter block in half.

Roll each half into a 5 by 7-inch rectangle. To assemble, roll the dough into an 8 by 18-inch rectangle. Place one butter rectangle in the center of the dough. Fold over flap of dough to cover, pressing dough at edges to seal. Place the remaining butter rectangle on top of the enclosed butter. Fold the remaining flap of dough to cover, sealing with your fingers; the butter should extend fully into the corners. Roll out the dough package in the direction of the open ends of folds into a 10 by 24-inch rectangle, dusting liberally with the flour and rolling in all directions.
Do not roll over the ends of the dough. Fold the dough into thirds, business-letter fashion. Refrigerate 1 hour (first turn). Rotate the dough block 90 degrees from the direction of the previous roll. Roll and repeat the 3-fold turn as before two more times (second and third turns). Refrigerate 45 minutes. Repeat the sequence, performing two more turns (fourth and fifth turns). Refrigerate at least one hour before rolling and shaping. Allow the sheet of rolled dough to rest in the refrigerator 15 minutes before cutting.

Tags: Laminated Bread // Add Comment »

Dough sheeters are invaluable appliances for making laminate products. The rollers of a sheeter are adjustable, able to perfectly roll a dough to the desired thickness. For laminate doughs, which start out as a thick block of dough, the rollers can be set progressively closer together after each pass of the paton. In addition to the obvious savings in time and labor, the even pressure applied to the dough by the rollers is hard to duplicate by hand.
The yeasted laminates—croissant and Danish—really benefit from specialized dough retarders. Retarders hold yeasted doughs slightly above normal refrigerator temperatures, allowing very slow fermentation to occur in either the paton or the formed product. Retarderproofer combination models can be programmed to steadily, slowly increase the temperature and humidity for an overnight rise. Proof boxes create a warm, humid environment, letting the dough rise uncovered and expand to maximum height. Even if you can’t afford a fancy electronic model, a simple proof box can be rigged with a hotel pan filled with water set over a Sterno. Ideal proofing temperatures are between 78° and 82°F at 80 percent humidity.

Tags: Laminated Bread // Add Comment »

Laminates may have almost equal weights of flour and fat, so naturally the fat you use affects the final texture and flavor. The fat you choose may alter the method: The ease of rolling and folding the fat into the détrempe is determined by that fat’s melting point and plasticity. Although butter is certainly the first choice for great-tasting pastry, it doesn’t necessarily make the highest or flakiest pastry. Lard, along with hydrogenated vegetable shortenings and hard margarines designed to be rolled into laminate doughs, possess large fat crystals that contribute to flaking. Lard and shortening have a lower water content than butter, meaning that an equal amount by weight will provide more fat, and therefore create a more tender product. Unfortunately, pastry made with shortening may have a waxy aftertaste, owing to the higher melting point of the fat.
Specialized laminate shortenings, whether lard or vegetable based, remain plastic over a large temperature range, forming a thin, continuous film that separates the rolled dough layers and prevents them from merging. Unlike butter, they will neither melt into the dough before baking nor become so hard when chilled that they rupture the layers when the dough is rolled. Working with butter requires excellent technique and careful handling of the dough, to be sure, but it produces superior flavor.
Be mindful of the ambient temperature, as well as that of the components, and be as diligent as possible in sealing edges and applying even pressure during rolling. Ideally, the détrempe and beurrage will be close to the same temperature, about 60°F, to ensure even fat distribution, minimize any leakage, and prevent cold butter from tearing through the dough layers. Do not use butter softened by sitting at room temperature for laminates, as it melts when handled. Instead, beat large chunks of cold butter into a malleable state by force, either with a rolling pin or a mixer fitted with the paddle. This ensures consistent temperature throughout the block.
Usually the détrempe is chilled to bring it to the same temperature as the butter, but using ice water and/or very cold milk to make the détrempe is a faster way to achieve a cool dough. To use this shortcut with yeasted doughs, select fresh yeast, rather than a dry yeast that requires rehydration in a warm liquid.

Tags: Laminated Bread // Add Comment »

Hard wheat flours, which have the proteins necessary to form a strong gluten structure, are used in making laminates. The gluten allows the dough to stretch rather than break under the stress of rolling, but it also causes the dough to become resistant to rolling as it is repeatedly handled and stressed. As a result, some soft flour is incorporated into the recipes. The ratio of high-protein flour to soft changes according to the amount of time a dough is allowed to rest between turns. Rapid or quick puff pastry, for example, is given all its turns at once without resting, and therefore requires a higher amount of soft flour to accommodate the constant stretching and rolling.

Tags: Laminated Bread // Add Comment »

Laminates include puff pastry dough, croissant dough, and Danish dough. Lamination is the process of rolling and folding a piece of dough to encase a block of butter and create hundreds of stacked layers of pastry. The ability of humble ingredients like the flour, butter, and water in classic puff pastry to rise over eight times their initial height during baking is gratifying and truly spectacular. The method for making all laminate doughs is virtually the same. A dough, the détrempe, whose primary ingredients are flour, water, and salt, is wrapped around a block of cool but malleable butter, the beurrage. Puff pastry and Danish pastry consist of roughly equal amounts by weight of butter to flour. The puff pastry détrempe consists of flour, water, a small amount of butter, and salt. Danish détrempe is a rich, soft, yeasted dough prepared with flour, milk, eggs, sugar, a very small amount of butter, and salt. The croissant détrempe is yeasted, like the Danish détrempe, but is much less rich. It contains water and/or milk, flour, a bit of sugar, and salt.
Once assembled into a neat package, the resulting dough blocks—the patons—are then rolled and folded in a series of turns, or tourage. This process of lamination is the sole leavening agent of puff pastry and it is what makes yeast-risen croissants and Danish flaky instead of merely breadlike.
Surprisingly, laminates rely on a well-developed gluten structure. The repeated rolling and folding of the dough creates pockets of trapped air between the many layers, but it also coils and joins the strands of gluten to form an elastic, expansive structure. This structure must be strong enough to contain the expanding gases as the pastry bakes. In the heat of the oven, most of the fat melts into the dough, leaving air pockets behind. Steam expands the air pockets, causing the layers of dough to separate from one another and rise.

Tags: Laminated Bread // Add Comment »

MAKES EIGHT LARGE (4-OUNCE) BAGELS

11 oz bread flour
5 oz pumpernickel flour
1 Tbs diastatic malt powder
8 oz (1 cup) cool water
8 oz INTERMEDIATE BARM BUILD
.25 oz (11?2) tsp. salt

In a mixer bowl, autolyse the flours, malt powder, and water. Mix in the barm build on low speed. Add the salt. Knead on medium speed until smooth and elastic, 8 to 10 minutes. The dough will be quite stiff. Ferment 4 hours. Divide. Bench 5 minutes. Form into rounds. With a thumb, poke a hole into the center of each dough ball. Insert both thumbs and work dough into a ring shape with a 11?2-inch hole in the center. Proof until increased by 25 percent, 45 minutes to 1 hour. (If they float after 15 seconds in a bowl of water, they are ready.) Retard overnight (or refrigerate) on oiled, semolina-dusted pans. Bring at least 4 inches of water to a boil in a heavy pot; reduce the heat to a simmer. Poach the bagels in batches; they will sink, then bob to the surface. Cook about 1 minute per side after they float. Drain with a slotted spoon. Place on a freshly oiled, semolinadusted pan at least 2 inches apart. Top as desired. Bake at 475°F for 16 to 18 minutes.

Tags: Bread Recipes 3 // 1 Comment »

MAKES EIGHT LARGE (4-OUNCE) BAGELS

1 lb bread flour
1 Tbs diastatic malt powder
8 oz (1 cup) cool water
8 oz INTERMEDIATE BARM BUILD
.25 oz (11?2 tsp) salt

In a mixer bowl, autolyse the flours, malt powder, and water. Mix in the barm build on low speed. Add the salt. Knead on medium speed until smooth and elastic, 8 to 10 minutes. The dough will be quite stiff. Ferment 4 hours. Divide. Bench 5 minutes. Form into rounds. With a thumb, poke a hole into the center of each dough ball. Insert both thumbs and work dough into a ring shape with a 11?2- inch hole in the center. Proof until increased by 25 percent, 45 minutes to 1 hour. (If they float after 15 seconds in a bowl of water, they are ready.) Retard overnight (or refrigerate) on oiled, semolina-dusted pans. Bring at least 4 inches of water to a boil in a heavy pot; reduce the heat to a simmer. Poach the bagels in batches; they will sink, then bob to the surface. Cook about 1 minute per side after they float. Drain with a slotted spoon. Place on a freshly oiled, semolina-dusted pan at least 2 inches apart. Top as desired. Bake at 475°F for 16 to 18 minutes.

Tags: Bread Recipes 3 // Add Comment »

MAKES EIGHT LARGE (4-OUNCE) BAGELS

POOLISH
8 oz water (1 cup) water
.03 oz (generous 1?4 tsp) instant yeast
4.5 oz bread flour

FINAL DOUGH
1 lb bread flour
1 Tbs (.3 oz) diastatic malt powder
.06 oz (1?2 tsp) instant yeast
4 oz (1?2 cup) hot water
.33 oz (2 tsp) salt

POOLISH Heat 1?4 cup of the water until hot; add the yeast. Stir together the remaining 1?2 cup cool water and the flour. Stir in the yeast mixture until smooth. Let rise until bubbly, doubled, and just beginning to fall, 3 to 5 hours. Refrigerate overnight.

FINAL DOUGH In a mixer bowl, combine the flour and malt powder. Combine the yeast and hot water. With mixer running on low speed, add the yeast mixture, poolish, and salt. Increase the speed to medium, and knead until smooth and elastic, 8 to 10 minutes. The dough will be quite stiff. Divide into eight 4-ounce pieces. Bench 5 minutes. Form into rounds. With a thumb, poke a hole into the center of the dough ball. Insert both thumbs and work dough into a ring shape with a 11?2-inch hole in the center. Let rise until increased by 25 percent, about 11?2 hours. (If they float, after 15 seconds in water, they are ready.) Refrigerate overnight on oiled, semonlina-dusted pans.
Bring at least 4 inches of water to a boil in a heavy pot; reduce the heat to a simmer. Poach the bagels in batches; they will sink, then bob to the surface, about 1 minute per side. Drain with a slotted spoon. Place on a freshly oiled, semolinadusted pan at least 2 inches apart. Top as desired. Bake at 475°F for 16 to 18 minutes.

Tags: Bread Recipes 3 // Add Comment »