Serve these Christmas Pudding Souffles to you guests and you will instantaneously be seen as a culinary genius. People are always impressed by a served a souffle, in fact they are a lot easier than people imagine.
These are The 12 Best Seasonings you need to get sensational results in the kitchen. They should be in everybody’s kitchen at home, and in fact, I would go so far as to say I feel culinary naked without these. Some of these you will …
How To Be A Shortbread Expert. There are thousands of recipes for shortbread, and an equal number of opinions as to the ingredients, methods, and baking. I suppose really you could think of shortbread as posh pastry, uplifted to celebrity status. The fundamentals of making shortbread are very like pastry and it would be worth reading our post on ‘Getting to grips with pastry.’ To put things into perspective.
The big barrier to getting crisp, light shortbread is gluten so a low protein plain flour, maximum 10% must be used. Shipton Mill do a nice Organic Soft Cake and Pastry White Flour with just over 9% protein.
This is a gluten free agent added into the flour to further reduce the protein in the flour and make it lighter.
Cornflour, always on hand and disappears into the flour perfectly. Use if you need a biscuit with a good snap Overdoing the quantity can make a dry powdery finish in the mouth.
Rice flour gives a rougher texture to the dough with a crumbly nature.
Ground almonds, make the dough crumblier, but also heavier. They also need a dash of almond essence to boost their flavour.
Some people like granulated sugar to give a gritty texture, but I’m not a fan.
Caster Sugar is a common choice and gives a good result. Golden caster offers a little more flavour in the dough.
Icing sugar is my preferred choice, unrefined sugar could also be used.
Use the best unsalted butter you can. The lower the water content of the butter the better the shortbread will be. While it may seem counter intuitive some chef’s lower quality use a pastry butter / margarine instead of superior quality dairy butter. This is because the pastry butter has an exceptionally low moisture content. The shortbread is crisper, but the flavour suffers.
True shortbread dough should be au natural, but I sometimes use a little vanilla to enhance the flavour of the butter. You could also add some chocolate chips or citrus zest if you like. Try sprinkling demerara sugar on the surface of the dough before cooking to add a sweet crunch.
Some small tweaks here to make the lightest shortbread. I use a two to one mix of plain flour and cornflour to really reduce the gluten content. I also like to add a touch of baking powder to help the dough rise in the oven and become airier. Finally, we use icing sugar to make a nice smooth dough. I like to roll the dough into logs and then slice the biscuits off (see below). This minimises stretching, and toughening the dough.
Here the rice flour helps lighten the dough. The texture of the rice flour is coarser, hence the ‘Sandy’ nature of the shortbread
This recipe uses ground almonds to reduce the gluten content of the flour. Along with the egg yolk this makes the shortbread richer abet slightly heavier.
Mix the butter icing sugar, vanilla, and salt (Unless you’re using salted butter) on low speed in the mixer until smooth. Increase the speed of the mixer to medium and cream the butter mix for three to four minutes. The mix should become soft and lighten.
Bring the speed of the mixer back to low and add the sifted flours mixing only just enough to incorporate the flour. Take extra care not to overwork the dough! It is better to finish the mixing of the dough by hand The lighter this is done the better the final shortbread will be.
Rollout the dough carefully dusting with a little flour as you go. Don’t be too vigorous with the rolling and turn the dough as you go. This will Roll the dough to the required thickness according to use and cut out with a cutter dipped in flour on each cut.
The remaining dough can be brought together once more then re rolled and cut again. Discard and dough left over from the second rolling.
If you can’t be bothered with all that rolling, and don’t mind slightly rustic biscuits there’s another option. Bring the dough together and split into two. Roll each dough into a log 4cm in diameter and wrap in greaseproof paper. Chill for 15 minutes, then slice into 1cm rounds.
Lay the biscuits out onto a baking sheet and prick with a fork. Leave to rest for about 15 minutes, use that time to heat up the oven read for baking. Bake the shortbread in the centre of the oven at 160° for roughly until light golden brown around the edges.
As the biscuits are removed from the oven dust with caster sugar and allow to cool before storage.
If you don’t have a food mixer you can make the dough in a food processor, or by hand. The processor makes a decent job of the creaming, but great care is needed not to overwork the dough when the flour is added. I would recommend using the processor just to cream the butter and sugar and then work in the flour by hand.
Yes, the best way of doing this is to carefully roll the dough into a log about 5cm in diameter. Wrap the log in greaseproof paper, then freeze on a tray. To bake, remove the cling film from the logs and slice into 5mm thick discs. Lay the biscuits out onto a baking tray, then place in the oven for around 8 minutes, until nicely golden brown.
I always do, but some people choose to use the rubbing in method. Mix the flour and sugar together then rub the cold diced butter in with your fingers or a pastry knife.
This will make a very crumbly shortbread with very little snap.
Easy, make the dough as described above. Line a rectangular baking tin with baking paper leaving a good overlap at the sides. Press the dough into the tin to a dept of 2cm than prick the dough all over with a fork. Leave the dough to rest for 15 minutes then bake as above. When cooked, remove from the oven, and let cool in the tin for 10 minutes. Then using the paper overlap, carefully lift the shortbread out onto a chopping board. Take a cook’s knife and using a guillotine like motion cut the shortbread into fingers. Let the shortbread cool completely before removing from the paper.
Enjoy Life!
John.
Hi, my name is John Webber, award winning chef and tutor, now retired to the west coast of Scotland. Welcome to our blog focusing on food, cooking, and countryside. My aim is to pass on my years of skills and knowledge together with an appreciation of the countryside.
Join us to experience the beauty of the west coast, cook some great food and be at ease in the kitchen.
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© Copywrite, John Webber. 2024
© Copywrite, John Webber. 2024
These Buttermilk Bread Rolls will really impress your dinner party guests. They go well with most starters that don’t require crispy rolls served alongside.
Home-Made Sausages are one of the most flexible foods we have available to us. Whether it’s a comforting plate of bangers and mash, fending off the cold weather. A quick buttered sausage roll as a snack or the compulsory BBQ sausage, it’s a year round go to treat.
When presenting classes at the Cookschool the classic question was How to Sharpen a Knife? This question would just about come up on every class. So, lets explain how to tackle the subject, its simpler than it looks, but need a little practice to get perfect. This is a lot of information but don’t be put off we are going to tackle this in nice easy steps.
I have broken this down into two posts, the first on periodic maintenance sharpening. And the second on using a sharpening steel. Once you have mastered these pages move on to Part 2 of the guide. Make a point of reading the whole article first, then return back to the sharpening section when you are ready to give it a go.
If your new to the kitchen and want to expand your skills look up the Food Files page on The Cutting Edge, The Knives to Choose and Use. This will explain the best types of knives to buy and what their functions are. To a chef their knives are the most important tools they have and need to be cared for.
The first thing to understand is that a sharp knife performs better and most of all is safer. But surely a sharp knife will cut you deeper that a blunt one? Well yes, but the whole idea is not to cut yourself at all.
Shortly I will put together an instructional page on how to use a knife properly and safely. The key to safe knife usage is to use the correct knife for the job and learning how to move the knife letting the edge do the job. Most people will use pressure to cut, and this is how most accidents happen. Putting force behind a knife allows it to do what is wants, often slipping into your body.
There are several kitchen gadgets now available to keep your knives sharp.
Some are better than others but learning how to do the job properly for each knife will protect your investment. And good knives will improve your kitchen skills and safety.
When the knife is manufactured, the cutting edge is ground into the blade. The angle of this cutting edge depends on the knife and the uses it will be put to. Most knives will have a basic angle where the steel is reduced in thickness. This is then finished with the cutting edge of the correct angle.
Top quality knifes are constructed from very hard steel which will hold an edge well and cut smoothly. Knives made from cheaper steel are easier to sharpen. But will blunt quickly requiring more grinding as thus wearing out quickly.
For cooks knives where heavier repetitive chopping will be the main function and the angle of the edge will be about 20˚. As the knife is used the fine edge on the blade of the knife will damaged. Ether forced over to one side, chipped or just eroded. Any damage will increase the resistance of the blade through the food. This resistance will cause extra pressure to be used and, in some circumstances, spoil the cutting action. Try chopping fresh herbs with a blunt knife. They will be wet, and crushed, not cut cleanly as they should be.
In most cases you can feel that the edge is not slicing as cleanly as it should. If you’re not sure theses one trick you can use to make a judgement.
Take a tomato and draw the blade over the skin as if you were removing a slice. A sharp knife will slice through the skin whereas a blunt knife will slide off the side of the fruit. If this happens, your knife needs to be sharpened.
Sharpening takes on two forms, Honing and Sharpening.
Honing, this is where the Cutting Edge has been eroded and needs to be replaced. This is done by grinding the blade on a Whetstone to return the blade to the angle required. This should only be done when needed or the life of the knife will be greatly diminished.
Tip. Run a felt tip pen down the ground edge of the knife before you start to sharpen it.
As you sharpen the ink will be removed allowing you to where you have sharpened and where you have missed. It will also let you check the angle you are using is correct.
Before use the whetstone needs to be soaked in water for 15-20 minutes before use. Have a bowl of water handy to moisten the stone if it dries out during use. The water lubricates the surface of the stone giving a smoother sharping action.
Make sure you have the correct grade of stone, and it has been well soaked. Take hold of the knife and place it on the stone with the blade facing away from you at about 40º to the stone.
Its important to use the right amount of downward pressure when running the knife across the whetstone. Between 2 -2.5kg of pressure is about right. The simplest way of gauging how hart to press is to use your kitchen scales. Place your knife on the scales and turn them on. With the scales zeroed place three fingers on the blade of the knife and press down. Keep an eye on the display and this will tell you when you have the correct amount of pressure applied to the blade. You can now transfer the knife to the stone ready to grind
Find the angle you need use (see below). Some manufactures supply a clip which fits onto the back of the blade and holds the knife at the correct angle on the stone. Failing that try wedging some coins under the blade to help you get the hang of it. Once you have the feel of the angle remove the coins and you’re good to go.
Draw the knife backwards towards you on the stone running from one end of the knife to the other. Don’t press down on the knife as you push froward but apply steady pressure as you pull the blade towards you. As the blade moves towards you
Its essential that all the blade is drawn over the stone as the knife is moved across the stone or steps will be formed on the cutting edge.
I would suggest you start with four of five cycles to begin with then more on to a new part of the blade. Repeat this until all the first side of the blade has been ground.
If all this is new to you, practice the movement with an old wooden spoon. When you think you have mastered it always start with an old knife to improve your skills, before attacking your best knives.
Now turn the knife over so the blade is facing towards you, this is a bit trickier.
Repeat the grinding process except this time apply pressure as you push the knife away from you. Don’t press down as it returns towards you.
Have a look at the edge and if you’re not happy give it a little more work. If you have been replacing the edge with a coarse stone, it’s a good idea to turn the stone over to a finer grade and give each side a pass over the stone to polish the edge.
Once you’re done Give the knife a good wash and clean the stone (see below). Leave the stone until bone dry before storing for next time.
ONE TIP. Only one person in the house should be responsible for sharpening. If everybody is having a go then will use slightly differing angles which will spoil the edge on the blade. In a professional kitchen, if you were to borrow a knife from somebody you would never sharpen it yourself. You would hand it back for them to do the sharpening.
Grinding the blade at the correct angle lengthens the life of the knife and allows the blade to function correctly. You don’t have to be spot on but be as consistent as possible each time the knife is sharpened.
The sharpening angle is the angle at which the blade is presented to the sharpening tool. The inclusive angle is what you would see if you took a cross section across the blade.
Heavy duty Cooks knives 20º-25º
Light duty cooks knives and slicing knives 15º-20º
Japanese style thin blade knives 15º+
Sharpening angle = 15˚
When you are finished sharpening rinse the stone under running water. If you have been sharpening quite a bit a paste will have built up on the surface of the stone. This can block the pours of the stone and reduce its effect. An old toothbrush is ideal for removing this and returning the surface to new. If It’s a really old stone, you have liberated from the shed, some WD40 can help remove the paste.
Leave the stone to dry overnight and when completely dry rub the stone with a just a little oil.
You can get special oil for the stones, but if you can’t find it baby oil works well. Don’t use vegetable oil or it will goo up the surface of the stone.
After quite a bit of use the surface of the stone may become misshapen. You can buy a stone shaper to grind away the highpoints and return the flat surface
A Whetstone is simply a sharpening stone. The ‘whet’ part of the name does not indicate water, it is a term meaning to sharpen. Think of the saying to whet (sharpen) your appetite
Most of the stones we use in a kitchen are lubricated with water but there are also stones which are lubricated with oil. If you already have a stone check to see if it’s a water or oil stone.
Whetstones come in different grades, and many have two sides, one coarse and one fine. The higher the grit number the rougher the stone and its action on the knife. A 400 grit stone is ideal if you need to replace the cutting edge. A 1000 to 2000 git stone is ideal for finishing the sharpening or putting a polish on small thin bladed vegetable knives.
Always start with the coarser grit stone to establish an edge moving on to the finer grit stones to perfect the edge.
When you are finished sharpening rinse the stone under running water. If you have been sharpening quite a bit a paste will have built up on the surface of the stone. This can block the pours of the stone and reduce its effect. An old toothbrush is ideal for removing this and returning the surface to new. If It’s a really old stone, you have liberated from the shed, some WD40 can help remove the paste. Leave the stone to dry overnight and store when completely dry.
Well, that’s enough to get you started. When you have mastered the Whetstone move on to Part 2 of this guide, using a Sharpening Steel Correctly. Don’t hurry it, with practice you will be able to keep a good edge on the blade and work more accurately and safely.
Enjoy Life !
John.
©John Webber. 2023
Learn how to make the best Basil Pesto. Simple tips and tricks to get the best from this classic sauce.
Make these easy soda breads at home. It’s so satisfying and rewarding everybody should be doing it.
How many times have you put a pan on the hob to cook vegetables let’s say, without thinking of what’s happening to, or what’s best for the food you are cooking? I’m guessing not often. Boiling, poaching, simmering – but what’s the difference? Not a lot you may think. But understanding but the application of wet heat is one of the most misunderstood methods of cookery.
Water boils at 100°c and boiling is unmistakable. The water bubbles vigorously and steam rises from the pan. Now try turning up the heat, the water will bubble faster, and more steam is produced causing the water to evaporate and the level of the water in the pan to drop. However, the water does not get any hotter all you are doing is bashing and stressing anything you are trying to cook in the pan.
Simple – well not that simple, the temperature of the water can be raised by increasing the pressure of the atmosphere around the water. This is exactly how a pressure cooker manages to cook more efficiently and reduce cooking time. Likewise, the boiling temperature will be reduced if the pressure is lower. If you have every wondered why the tea is never good in a plane, now you know.
Think about what you are cooking and how the heat in the liquid will affect the food. So much food especially fish is ruined by poaching at too high a temperature. I always use a Probe Thermometer to simplify the process and confirm you have the correct temperature for your purpose.
Sterilising utensils and storage jars – see The Golden Rules of Home Preserving
Green vegetables need to go into rapidly boiling water. By adding salt to the water, we increase the temperature slightly helping to retain colour and nutrients. This can be followed by plunging the vegetables into iced water to stop the cooking and set the colour (known as blanching). The vegetable can then be gently heated when required simplifying serving the meal. Place a lid on the pan after adding the vegetables but remove it as soon as the water returns to the boil. Green vegetables give off an acidy gas when heated. Which if recycled back into the water can spoil the colour of the vegetables.
Cooking pasta. The rapid movement of the water helps separate the pasta and helps prevent it sticking to each other. The high heat also forms a skin on the paste to prevent it disintegrating in the pan.
Often following boiling, to continue the cooking without breaking up the product. When cooking main crop potatoes as soon as they boil reduce the heat and simmer gently. If your spuds always break up in the pan, you’re a slave to the boil. Also used to allow a larger item of food to cook through without drying out.
Possibly the most misunderstood and badly executed methods of cooking. Critical for the successful cooking of fish and producing the best poached egg. Plenty of energy to cook the foods without drying out and toughening the protein.
Recognisable by small bubbles forming in the liquid then rising and falling. A small amount of steam may also be visible.
Here the food is suspended above boiling liquid to apply a more gentle heat. The heat of the steam itself depends on how well the cooking container is sealed. Under pressure the steam can reach well over 100˚c often used to cook more delicate foods like fish or broccoli.
In the case of boiling the cooking liquid is most commonly water. In the case of Simmering, Poaching, and steaming a flavoured liquid can be used. When cooking fish, it may be poached in a white wine stock. A medium known as a Court Bouillon (aromatic vegetables, herbs, water salt and a dash of vinegar). Is used to cook oily fish like salmon.
Adding a few herbs and spices to the water used to steam food will enhance the flavour of the food been cooked.
So next time you are cooking something in a liquid, give some thought to the food you are cooking, and how you want it to cook. Your, food will all the better for it!
Learn the classic skill of dissecting a chicken on the bone. Ideal for a chicken saute’ or casserole
All you need to know about _Eggs. Learn about the egg itself. what each part of an egg can do, and how we can use it in our cooking.
Demystifying perfect pastry is not as daunting as you may think. We will begin by looking at the ingredients and what they do in a dough. We can then move on to understanding how the method of making a dough and how it affects the final result. For this article we are focused on basic sweet and short pastry. Future posts and Food Files will cover more advanced doughs such as Choux, Puff, and Hot Water pastries as well as yeast doughs and breads.
The Basics.
In a nutshell pastry is a dough containing flour, fat, and liquid (water and or egg). Sugar is also used when making pastry for sweets and desserts. While this may seem limiting the variations in combining these ingredients provides us with a range of products with both sweet and savoury uses. Before we begin to dive deeper into the pastry itself, let’s get a understand the ingredients used. If you haven’t already, Look up our posts on Getting to Grips with Pastry and Blind Baking to get a deeper insight into great pastry.
Flour.
Most commonly (but not always) in terms of pastry we are discussing milled white wheat flour. The main characteristic of the wheat/flour we are interested in is its protein content and it’s important to use the correct flour for the job in hand. In kitchens we refer to cake flour, plain flour, and strong flour. This is simply a useful reference to the amount of protein in the flour.
Cake Flour. 8-9% protein. Not that easy to find now, most people use plain flour as a replacement. If you want to try it out add roughly 15-20% cornflour to plain flour and sift together, semolina or rice flour can also be used. This is quite a common technique in making shortbread.
Plain Flour, 10-12% protein. Readily available and possible the most common flour found at home. Self-raising flour is simply plain flour with chemical raising agents added.
Strong Flour, 12-16% More commonly used for bread or leavened products. We will cover this in more detail with a later post on bread making.
There are of course many other types of flour available to us including wholemeal versions of the above but rather than get into too much detail here I want to focus on the pastry itself.
For more flour facts look up https://fabflour.co.uk/
Fats.
For pastry butter, margarine, or lard can be used. They all do a similar job but in diverse ways.
Butter is best for flavour and should always be unsalted. This can seem odd when most recipes will add salt to the mix be it sweet or savoury but by using unsalted butter, we have total control over the salt content of the dough. Butter also melts at a reasonably low temperature in the region of 30˚c to 35˚c. Now this can be a pain in making the dough if rubbing in the fat, but it means that the fat will melt in the mouth during eating. Other pastry fats like lard melt at a higher temperature 36˚c + which means the fat can solidify in the mouth as if cools.
Not all butters are equal, have a look at the butters on offer where you shop. The use by dates of the salted versions will be much longer than the unsalted versions. Salt is added for flavour but also as a preservative to lengthen the life of the butter. We want our butter to be as fresh as possible with a rich cream natural flavour.
Also have a look at the fat content of the butters, but surely butter is fat? Well not all of it, the fat content will differ according to manufacture and origin. Why is this of interest, well most of the weight of the butter that’s not fat will be moisture. If you have ever melted butter, then poured it into a dish you will have discovered a layer of milky water sitting below the fat.
Now would you just add more liquid into your pastry just for the hell of it? Well, that’s what you are doing by using butter with a flow fat content. Aim to buy a butter with at least 80% fat. Preferably 83% or more if you can.
Lard
If we decide to use lard as our fat source, we don’t need to worry about the moisture content, but the flavour suffers. Also been a firmer fat then butter it’s easier to get a light crumbier pastry. Some chefs like to use half butter, half lard in savoury pastry. I do this for my Christmas mince pies. It gives just the right texture and the last thing I need it a sweet pastry shell combined with a very sweet filling.
Margarine
If using margarine, it must be a hard margarine produced for pastry making, not one of the many blended or soft margarines available. For cake making the margarine can be softer but in pastry we need the firmness of the fat to produce a light finish. This also has the advantage of a very low moisture content which is important as we will see later.
Eggs or Water?
The choice of using egg or water to bind a dough really depends on the method of making the dough and the characteristics you want the dough to have.
A large egg is made up of about 9% fat, 12% protein, and the balance been water and minerals making up the remainder.
Water is of course 100% water and has no ability to hold back gluten or bind a dough together.
The protein in egg will add structure but overdoing it will make the pastry tougher. look up our Food Files page on All you need to know about – Eggs to get a deeper insight on the egg itself.
The fat in the yolk assists the fat in the recipe to hold back the gluten and the yolk also acts as an emulsifier to help hold the water and fat in the recipe together. This in the case of beaten mixes (see my sable recipe) binds the dough together and gives volume
So, in a nutshell using egg will give a dough more structure and reduce the amount of pure water needed to bind the dough. However, the egg will also take away some of the crumbly nature of the cooked pastry. Using water will provide a crumbly texture as long as the dough is not overworked, and the gluten toughened making the pastry chewy.
For more information on eggs look up https://www.egginfo.co.uk
Sugar
Adding sugar to a rubbed in pastry will of course sweeten the dough but will also make the pastry colour more in baking. Using an unrefined sugar will also enhance the flavour of the pastry.
When making a dough by the creaming method it does both of the above and also cuts though the fat allowing it to distribute though the flour more efficiently and hold back the gluten.
Now if your still with me Well Done!
That’s a lot of info which I hope will allow you to make informed decisions when choosing or amending the pastry recipes you decide to use. Grab a cup of coffee, take a breath and we can more on. Let’s now have a look at the physical process of making the dough.
Going back to the flour information of this post I mentioned the protein content of the flour and how this defined which flour we would use for a particular job. The reason for this is that when hydrated these proteins begin to form a product known as Gluten. Think of it as an elastic bungee holding the dough together.
Gluten can be an advantage to us or a bit of a pain, it forms naturally in a dough, so all a bread dough needs to begin forming gluten is time and water. Working the gluten strengthens it and makes it more elastic. This is an advantage in doughs where we need to the dough to stretch as the gasses in the dough expand in the heat of the oven as in making bread.
With basic pastries this strength is the last thing we need. If you have ever found your pastry has shrunk back down the tin in baking, it’s a sure sign that the dough has been overworked in ether the mixing or rolling out or often in both! When rolling out your pastry, don’t just roll in one direction. Turn the dough as you are rolling to even out the stressing of the dough. If the dough springs back as you try to roll it out, its already too elastic. The best you can do is to pop it into the fridge on the rolling mat to rest for 20 minutes then have another go. Always rest a rolled dough before baking to minimise shrinkage.
So, a key thing is to handle our pastry as little and as lightly as possible. If making the dough on a machine I prefer to let the machine do any rubbing in or creaming but then bring the dough together by hand, so I am in control of the mixing.
Demystifying perfect pastry, the Creaming method.
If you haven’t already check out my Best Sweet Pastry post for a recipe to produce a versatile tart dough. The process is like making shortbread but uses icing sugar which fully incorporates into the dough and has egg for a binding. Any additional moisture needed to bring the dough together is provided by double cream. The net result of this is to use the least water possible to bring the dough together. This gives us a pastry robust enough to be cut and support a filling while not been tough.
The principle of a creamed dough is that the fat having been mixed right through the dough forms a barrier to the gluten forming long strands and toughing the pastry.
Demystifying perfect pastry, the Rubbing in method.
This is the normal procedure for producing shortcrust pastry, the ‘short’ part of the term referring to how well the pastry breaks up in the mouth. Again, controlling the gluten is important to avoid toughness but the primary factor is how we combine the fat into the dough. Temperature is important. Whereas in our creamed dough room temperature is ideal when rubbing in, we need the fat and our tools be Again, as cool as possible.
The idea is to rub the fat into the flour to form fine particles without the fat melting into the flour. Now as I said before butter melts below blood heat so unless you have nimble quick fingers there’s a chance the butter will begin melt before it totally worked in. Dicing the butter then returning it into the fridge helps and a cold mixing bowl is essential.
The easy option is to use a high melting point fat, and this is the most popular option for manufactured pastries. It may say butter on the packet, but its not butter as you know it.
Think of short pastry as a brick wall, if everything is firmly combined it has strength and toughness and is difficult to break though. Now imagine we have gaps in the mortar and the bricks are sandy. The wall is weak and will collapse easily without using a lot of effort.
This is what the fat in the pastry does, having small particles of fat in the dough prevents the gluten forming together while the dough is raw. Then when cooking the fat melts to leave weakness in the pastry which gives the finished pastry its light crumbly nature.
Dealing with pastry, best practice.
In making creamed doughs keep everything at room temperature.
In making rubbed in doughs keep everything cool and use a pastry knife to cut in the fat.
Rest the dough after making and before rolling to give the dough time to bind and relax
When rolling a dough cool the work surface and rolling pin if it’s a warm day. A polypropylene rolling pin is the best option.
Don’t overdo the amount of four used when rolling out, just a dusting should be enough. Too much flour will embed itself into the dough and spoil the pastry when baked.
Work quickly but carefully, turn the dough during rolling to even out the stress of stretching the dough out.
Always rest the rolled dough before baking.
Have the oven preheated to a slightly higher temperature that needed to cook the pastry. Place the goods into the oven then turn down the heat to the cooking temperature. This will help counteract the loss of heat when opening the oven door.
I hope all that information hasn’t overwhelmed you, take a little time to work through it all. Practice makes perfect so give it a go and remember to enjoy your cooking.
Enjoy life!
John.
How to choose the best knives for the kitchen and improve your cooking.