Tuesday, June 23, 2015

Butter Puff Biscuit Dough – Faster, Easier, and Not Great for Shortcake

As promised, this is the puff pastry-like dough I used in the apple roses video, and while not exactly “ quick and easy,” this was definitely quicker and easier. Just don’t try and make strawberry shortcake with this stuff.

I wanted to use this dough as the centerpiece of our strawberry shortcake video, but unfortunately the cold pastry was way too hard to cut with a spoon, and so I ended up using a much more traditional, and user-friendly biscuit.   

That aside, as a puff pastry substitute, I think this was a huge success. Hopefully, you saw this in action in the apple roses video, which, by the way, was done with scraps. Besides fruit tarts, I’d love to try this for things like ham and cheese turnovers, and chocolate croissants.

With that in mind, I hope any and all successful experiments with this dough will be shared on social media; mostly so I can copy your ideas. By the way, there seems to a little controversy on YouTube as to the exact number of layers we got, so what say you? I hope you give this butter puff biscuit dough a try soon. Enjoy!


Ingredients:
2 cups self-rising flour (You can make you own by sifting together 2 cups of all-purpose flour with 1 tablespoon baking powder, and 1 teaspoon fine salt)
3/4 cup cold water (add enough water to make a soft, but not sticky dough)
*7 tablespoons frozen unsalted butter (a stick is 8 tablespoons)

*I grated on about 4 tablespoons for the first application, and about 3 tablespoons for the second.
- I generally bake this stuff at 400 F.  Time will depend on what it’s being used for.

28 comments:

Ettore said...

I've never seen self rising flour at the store. Will look more

Unknown said...

The eggs in your fridge are about a month expired. I wouldn't eat them.

rodentraiser said...

CHOCOLATE CROISSANTS! YES!

Trying to find these anywhere is like panning for gold. I first had them in Los Gatos and when I moved to the Northwest, I found them in a specialty store...for a while. Now they're gone again and most people have never heard of them.

If I get one more cool day, I'm going to the store for chocolate today and making this butter puff pastry dough (with chocolate) tomorrow.

We're facing a heat wave here, so I'm cooking ahead of time and putting things in the freezer (no cooking during a heat wave). Chef John, I have your Prison Style Meatloaf in the oven as I type and your spaghetti sauce is simmering on the stove. I made the Mascarpone potatoes yesterday to go with the meatloaf, so I'm all set.

Thank you for your recipes, Chef John. Otherwise I'd be eating nothing but the four food groups next week: Pizza Hut, McDonalds, Kentucky Fried, and Taco Bell.

Bob said...

Could these be cut and shaped and perhaps filled like a crossant ?

Unknown said...

Oh Mr. Food how about cheese and very tiny asparagus chopped �� My Taste buds are saying yes ��

Unknown said...

I just finished making the dough tonight! What should I make for a main dish tomorrow for dinner that this would go well with? Maybe a split pea soup? Or just a steak and use it like a dinner roll? What do you guys think?

meigancam01 said...

Great article with excellent idea! I appreciate your post. Thanks so much and let keep on sharing your stuffs keep it up.

Unknown said...

Chef John - This recipe w/ video demo. is one of the main reasons that I continue to watch your site on a daily basis (I'm never too old to learn!) - Thanx Teach. !!

Beth said...

Does this bake into crisp tenderness, like a Danish dough, or is it more bready/buttery? Thinking ahead to possible applications (and to not having to measure each turn with a ruler!)

Yakuzalizard said...

Hello Chef...I know this is off topic...but will please do a cucuzza recipe? The only way I have ever eaten it is in red gravy over pasta...we eat cacuzza and hard boiled eggs during lent to replace meat.

Fr. Yousuf said...

Will this work for making Vol au Vents?

Unknown said...

Just made your puff biscuit, delicious!! Flakey, buttery, not too sweet. I stuffed it with chocolate and almond paste, both delicious. I just had a hard time rolling it out the dough, (did I do something wrong?) it seemed like the dough was tuff. I was trying to go for a croissant type look but was only able to make tiny rolls out of the almond paste and folded over the chocolate. Although I thought I had trouble with the dough the finished product was wonderful.!

rodentraiser said...

I am FINALLY getting to making these today (two week heatwave + angiogram + plus another weekend heatwave + having to get more chocolate because I ate the first bar I bought = long delay).

Wendy, I'm making chocolate croissants and I'm going to make the croissants square with the chocolate in the middle, because that's the only way I've ever seen them. I think that might be easier.

I have a few questions, though, if any one can help me: as I have to make these by hand, at the beginning, does this mean I actually knead the dough for a couple of minutes?

Also, I recently saw a video where someone cut the dough into thirds and stacked it as opposed to folding it. Is there any advantage or disadvantage to that?

And I also had a question about biscuits: could you use this folding in tri-folds for biscuits to give them the flaky layered look? Or would that overwork the dough too much?

I also thought that in the middle of a tri-fold for biscuits, I might NOT brush the flour off, so when the biscuits were done, they would fall apart right in the middle for buttering. Would that would work?

Sorry, maybe I should have put those questions in the biscuit thread.

OK, the dough should be chilled now for the first butter and folds, so it's time to break in the new rolling pin.

rodentraiser said...

Mine just came out of the oven and they are surprisingly good and really do taste like chocolate croissants. What they look like is something else altogether.

Everything went well until the chocolate part. I left the last half fold undone and put the dough into the fridge to chill. After it was chilled, I rolled it out and proceeded to apply chocolate. I had bought the cooking bar of chocolate and I tried to grate the chocolate onto the dough. Dear God.

The chocolate went everywhere, just like airborne anthrax and matters were not helped when I pushed the bag of self rising flour on the floor. But I finally got all the chocolate grated except for that last little piece (which I ate) and then I folded over the dough one last time and tried to roll it out into a large oblong piece.

The chocolate wouldn't stay on the dough. The dough wouldn't roll. Fortunately, I know lots of bad words and finally got the dough rolled out, and then I cut it into squares. Well, I got 4 squares and two mutant looking apple turnover looking things.

Putting my croissants on the baking sheet caused more chocolate to fall off. If I do this again, I'm going to melt the chocolate and spread it on that way. I didn't bother with the egg wash because of all the grated chocolate and flour on top.

But all is forgiven because these are really, really good and I'm going to go eat my second one.

I found out the hard way why we have to freeze the butter, but why do we have to chill the dough? All I have to show for that is heat packs on my poor, quivering little arm muscles.

Unknown said...

Mine did not come out nearly as high. They still had a lot of layers and had a buttery, flaky taste though. Perhaps my problem was working with the dough too much; the dough ended up too elastic and overworked. I might try this recipe again though; they still taste pretty good when imperfect.

Unknown said...

I'm going to try to make the rose apples as accurately as possible so I was also going to try this recipe. How many of the apple rose strips do you think this recipe would make?

Seeker said...

Can you use scraps or will this only yield the 4 biscuits you show on the video.
Thanks

Patty said...

What did you sprinkle on top of the biscuits before baking them?

Unknown said...

Hey Chef John - No matter how high my pc volume, I still can't 'hear' what kind of sugar that you said you sprinkled on top of these 'butter puffs'. Care to spell it out for me? (I want to try the original recipe first, per your instructions.) Thanx 4 a reply.

Chef John said...

It's demerara sugar! Enjoy!

Unknown said...

Thanx so very much Chef John 4 the quick reply; now I can try this recipe. Here's my homemade pun to you - - Since my given name is also John, when I'm in the kitchen either repeating or trying your recipes, I jokingly call myself Chef John JUNIOR !! Anyway, keep up the good work / publishing your videos; I'm hooked.

Anonymous said...

Can someone tell me what 400°F is in Celsius?

Unknown said...

200C, at least close enough for government work.

Bokpro said...

I really love your videos. Thanks a Lot!

Miss Xteena said...

Chef John! Love your videos! This was the first puff pastry-esque recipe I've tried, and it was a resounding success! But I have a question. Why do my biscuits always come out lopsided? The only solution I've seen is to avoid twisting the cutter, which I've stopped doing. Still, they weren't the tall, beautiful biscuits I'd hoped for. Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Unknown said...

I wonder what are you sprinkle on the top of the biscuits before baken them?

My Cookie Kitchen said...

This puff biscuit gave me pause. I have Rose Levy Beranbaum's Flaky Dough recipe. I want to use that one to do puff pastry with. I have looked at your recipe and others, and I think you can make puff pastry out of a lot of doughs. Am I wrong on that?

Ashley said...

Instead of making the dough couldn't you use regular puff pastry? You should try that.