Puff Pastry

I've wanted to make puff pastry for ages, but I've always had a fear of it. It seems like a daunting undertaking, but it really, really isn't. It takes a bit of time, but not that much actual doing of anything, a lot of waiting, but who of you hasn't at some point recently spent a day off watching television or playing a game. It's really a lot nicer than shop bought stuff, not to mention cheaper. And for me it gives a wonderful sense of satisfaction at having made something yourself. One very important thing before you start-don't handle the dough too much, it needs to stay as cold as possible, so be quick, and get it back in the fridge as soon as you can.

Ingredients-
500g Flour
500g Butter (unsalted or slightly salted)
250ml(ish) water
1 tbsp lemon juice
Salt

Method:

1. Mix the flour and salt with one third of the butter (that's 166.6666666g annoyingly). I did this with my Magimix, but I'm sure doing it by hand would be just fine.

2. Add the lemon juice and as much of the water as it takes for the mixture to come together into a nice stretchy dough. As it get's closer to this point add the water slowly, because too much water and you get a sticky mess. I didn't need the full 250ml.

3. Press the dough into a square roughly 2cm thick and let it rest for an hour, wrapped in some greaseproof paper. At this point I also cut the remaining butter into 2cm thick slices, that when put together were slightly smaller than the square of dough. The other option here is to beat the butter between 2 sheets of greaseproof paper until it is this shape and thickness. Put this in the fridge also.

4. Take the dough out and roll out to twice it's length-a long rectangle. Place the butter on half of the dough and fold the other half over. Press the edges tightly and make sure you don't get any air pockets. Now you have a dough sandwich with the butter between. Roll this out to 1 cm thick once more, making sure no butter comes out the sides. Fold the dough by taking one side and folding it over one third of the total length, then take the other side and fold it over the original fold. That's called one 'turn'.

5. Put it back in the fridge and let it cool, I tried 10 mins in the freezer followed by 15 in the fridge. Then take it out and do another turn, the opposite way to the previous, and repeat until you have done 6 turns.

6. Make the last turn as neat as possible, and let it rest for at least an hour before using it. I did it late in the day so mine was in the fridge overnight and it was fine the next day.

That's it, done. I hope you got the folding instructions ok. If in doubt, ask. This was my first time making it, and it was a resounding success, and so very easy. Coming soon I will show you two things I made with it; Sausage rolls and a Pizza-thing. This is definitely one to try though, so very easy, and the turns don't take much time, just pick a day you're doing nothing else and do it. One tip that I keep reading about puff pastry is that it's important to use good quality butter, and French butter at that. It has a higher melting point, so it behaves better when working with it, and stays between the layers better for flakier pastry. Have fun!