Abaisse - a French term for a sheet of thinly rolled pastry.
To honour this term, and for a nice easy introduction, I made Orange and Ginger Palmiers. For those who don't know, Palmiers are a biscuit made from puff pastry, which is modelled into a long decorative log shape, with a sweet or savory filling between the layers, sliced and then baked. (At least, I think they are considered to be a "biscuit"). The beauty of palmiers is that they're equally decorative as they are tasty.
Well, I say "I made" - by the time I'd worked out what the filling should be, and how the pastry is meant to be rolled up to create the distinctive scroll shape (which I got wrong the first time and had to peel the pastry apart to have another go), the pastry had warmed up and become sticky. So I baked the offcuts from the very ends of the roll, and stuck the rest in the fridge to cool off, where it remains at the moment. I plan to finish the actual baking of the palmiers tomorrow; currently debating with myself whether to eggwash the biscuits before cooking, since the offcuts came out paler than expected. Also, the orange and ginger flavour was not as strong as I had expected it to be, which was surprising considering the amount of orange peel, fresh and dried ginger in the filling; wondering whether all the butter in the puff pastry somehow conceals/dilutes strong flavours, or whether I just really underestimated what was needed. (Or whether I just tried an offcut with no filling in it.) Although I am quite happy that I finally got the shaping right, even if one scroll is slightly bigger than the other. Hope to have an image of the finished product available soon.
Next up, "Abbatoir"...
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