Today I tried two recipes, because the first one I tried seemed to be failing as I was making it, I just started a second batch halfway through preparing the first batch. Luckily the first batch turned out okay, according to the husband... The first batch's recipe can be found here. I made the first batch into chocolate chip snail rolls:
They look fine and have are crispy on the the outside and flaky on the inside. They are not too sweet and flaky, but a bit too oily. There was even a little bit of oil on the baking tray after I removed them.
Now compare the chocolate snails with the Almond sweet rolls:
Light, fluffy, not oily, not too sweet, crisp on the outside, flaky on the inside, just perfect! I cut open one of these as soon as they cooled and at first I was disappointed. The inside didn't look flaky at all, but I gave it a try anyway. Light and fluffy! For this batch I used a different recipe, which can be found here. Classic sweet rolls are made with jam as filling in the center, but I don't like jam so I substituted jam with almond paste mixed with butter. Love almond paste!
About Danish pastry dough: It might seem like an impossible task to make all those fluffy flaky layers you see when you bite into a professional made pastry. The layers you see are achieved by layering dough with butter. The butter melts into the dough when you bake it, making the pastry light and flaky. I have not yet achieved the actual layering, but light and flaky is not as hard as it seems. The dough is actually quite easy to make, it just takes a lot of time. The first time I tried I started around 10 in the morning and finished baking around 1 in the morning the next day... but that also depends on which recipe you use. Some recipes tell you to let your dough sit in the fridge overnight and one hour after each turn. Since you'll need to do about 4 turns, you'll need about 12 hours. The recipe I used took me about 8 hours to finish. So when you try to make this pastry, start somewhere in the morning and you'll have fresh pastries for a great afternoon snack or after dinner snack.
I said turns. That is how you get the layers. You fold a slab of butter into the dough and keep folding it to create layers. The dough is folded like a business letter, then turned 90 degrees, rolled out and folded again. So that explains why the folding is called turns. Apparently there are set amounts of turns for each kind of pastry dough. I do 4 turns for my Danish.
Notes: whenever you put the dough down to make your turns, be sure to flour the surface you work on. And I mean seriously flour it. Not just a little sprinkle, put down a blanket of it. The last thing you want is your dough sticking to your tabletop and ruining all the layers you made when you have to scrape the dough off your tabletop. Also, you'll need plastic wrap, a lot of plastic wrap. You'll be beating butter between double layers of wrap, wrapping your dough to put it in the fridge to rest and covering the pastries when you proof them. A pastry brush is also required to brush of any excess flour off your dough. Excess flour will make pastry dry and ruin layers. I use a silicon brush that is actually used to brush on egg wash and oil baking pans, but it works just fine.
Danish pastry might seem impossible, but it really isn't! Just stop thinking about how difficult it may be and start making it. You'll see it's actually really easy once you get the hang of it. And there is nothing more rewarding than biting into some awesome pastry after hours of work.
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