by Julia Child
A rack
The remaining strained apricot
1 Tb sugar (or juices from macerated fruits)
A wooden spoon
A kitchen spoon or pastry brush
A serving tray or board
Optional: crème fraîche, sweetened crème Chantilly (lightly whipped cream), or crème anglaise (custard sauce)
Slide tart on a rack. Boil the apricot and sugar, stirring, for several minutes until last drops to fall from spoon are sticky. Spoon or brush the apricot over the fruit to glaze it. Serve tart warm, tepid, or cold, sliding it first onto tray or board. Cut into crosswise pieces for each serving. Pass optional cream or sauce separately.
(*) The tart is at its best eaten a few hours after baking; leftovers will be delicious, but never as wonderful as the freshly baked tart.
Baking the fruit in a round pastry shell
Use the same general system, but arrange the slices of fruit in a spiral, or in rows of diminishing width from circumference to center, like the spokes of a wheel.
Other fruits to be baked in puff pastry shells
Fresh pitted cherries, fresh apricot or prune-plum halves placed skin-side down, fresh sliced peaches, or well-drained canned apricots or peach slices may be done this same way.
Fresh fruits in prebaked puff pastry shells
Use prebaked puff pastry shells, just as you would prebaked shells made from pie-crust dough, as suggested in Volume I, pages 640–1, for strawberry tart and its variations. This has a pastry-cream filling, but you may use simply a waterproofing of the red-currant glaze, arrange the strawberries or other fresh fruits on top, and paint with more glaze; pass whipped cream or custard sauce separately.
JALOUSIE
[Peekaboo Jam or Fruit Tart of French Pastry]
Very quick to assemble and delicious, because puff pastry turns anything into a treat, is this attractive tart with its jam or fruit filling. Translated literally from the French, it would be called the Venetian Blind Tart, since that is what jalousie means; peekaboo seems more appealing.
For a 6- by 16-inch tart, serving 6 people
1) Forming the tart
½ the recipe for simple puff pastry; or reconstituted leftovers
A dampened pastry sheet
A table fork
A cup or so of excellent raspberry, strawberry, or blackberry jam, or other suggestions listed at end of recipe
Roll half the pastry into an 8- by 18-inch rectangle ⅛ inch thick. Roll up on pin, and unroll topside down onto dampened pastry sheet. Prick all over at ⅛-inch intervals with tines of fork, going right down through to pastry sheet.
Spread a ¼-inch layer of jam over pastry, leaving a ¾-inch border of pastry all around.
Turn borders of pastry up over filling at sides; wet corners, and turn ends over, sealing corners with fingers.
Roll out second piece of pastry into a 7- by 17-inch rectangle (slightly larger than shape of filled pastry), ⅛ inch thick. Flour surface lightly; fold in half lengthwise. Measure opening of filled pastry and mark folded pastry to guide you. Cut slits in the dough from folded edge, as shown, making them ⅜ inch apart and half as long as width of opening in tart.
Wet edges of filled bottom layer of pastry with cold water. Unfold top layer of pastry over it; brush off accumulated flour, and press pastry in place with fingers. Then, with back tines of a fork, press a decorative vertical border all around sides. Cover and chill for at least 30 minutes, or until baking time.
(*) AHEAD-OF-TIME NOTE: When chilled and firm, may be wrapped airtight and frozen for several months. Remove from freezer, glaze, and bake as in Step 2.
2) Baking and serving—about 1 hour at 450 and 400 degrees
Egg glaze (1 egg beaten in a small bowl with 1 tsp water)
A pastry brush
A table fork or small knife
A rack
A serving tray or board
Optional: crème fraîche, crème Chantilly, or crème anglaise as suggested for preceding recipe, Step 3
When oven has been preheated to 450 degrees, set rack in lower-middle level. Paint surface of chilled jalousie with egg glaze; wait a moment, and give it a second coat. Make cross-hatchings on top of sides and ends through glaze with fork or knife, and set jalousie in the oven. In about 20 minutes, when pastry has risen and is browning nicely, turn heat down to 400. Bake 30 to 40 minutes more, covering loosely with foil or brown paper if surface is browning too much.
Jalousie may seem done before it actually is; sides should be firm and crusty, and object of long cooking is to dry out and crisp all inner layers of the pastry. Slide onto a rack when done. Serve warm, tepid, or cold, with optional cream or sauce passed separately. Cut into crosswise slices for each serving.
(*) As with all puff pastries, this is best when freshly baked.
Other fillings
Cooked fruits rather than jams are also desirable fillings for the jalousie. Among them we suggest the apricot filling. Another idea is a filling of baked apple slices, such as those for the gratin de pommes, Step 2; spread some apricot jam over the pastry before piling on the baked apple slices, and more over the apples before you cover them with the pastry. Pitted prunes stewed in wine, butter, and sugar, and mixed with toasted almonds or chopped walnuts would be delicious. Glazed canned pineapple and diced bananas is another idea; glaze the pineapple following the directions for the orange mousse. These are only a few possibilities, and you will think of many others yourself.
MILLE-FEUILLES
[Napoleons—Layers of Puff Pastry Interspersed with Pastry Cream or Whipped Cream; Iced with Fondant and Chocolate or with Confectioner’s Sugar]
The mille-feuilles dessert, according to some authorities, was not developed in France until the latter part of the nineteenth century. The name “Napoleon,” at any event, is not associated with it at all in any French recipes; the French icing, furthermore, is simply a layer of confectioner’s sugar. The rest of the world has long wondered, then, how the pastry came to be named “Napoleon” outside of France, and who changed the icing from confectioner’s sugar to white fondant and lines of chocolate. The Danes have been told for generations that a Danish royal pastry chef invented the dessert way back in the early 1800’s on the occasion of a state visit between the Emperor Napoleon and the King of Denmark, in Copenhagen. The Italians are sure it is a corruption of Napolitain, because of the layered pastries made in Naples. Some sources believe that the chocolate lines appear to form the letter N, for Napoleon—which is far easier for foreigners to pronounce anyway than mille-feuilles. A final story, with a certain air of mischievous fumisterie about it, is that the dessert was really a French invention after all, and Napoleon’s favorite pastry; he ate so many of them, however, on the eve of Waterloo that he lost the battle. The pastry then disappeared from view for half a century; when it finally reappeared from banishment, it wore another icing and a new name.
MANUFACTURING NOTES
Mille-feuilles and Napoleons are thin rectangles of crisply baked puff pastry that are mounted in 3 layers with whipped cream or pastry cream in between, and a topping of confectioner’s sugar for mille-feuilles or of white frosting and lines of chocolate for Napoleons.
The traditional method of forming and cutting them, illustrated in the following recipe, is to bake the pastry in large sheets, and to cut each sheet into 3 long strips 4 inches wide, as in Step 4. After the 3 strips are glazed with apricot, the first is spread with filling, the second is laid over the first and filled, then the third strip is laid on top, and covered with sugar or fondant. This giant mille-feuilles is finally cut crosswise into rectangular serving pieces 4 inches long and 2 inches wide, as shown in the final drawing.
This is certainly the easiest and most practical method, and works especially well for puff pastry made with the French household flour or its American equivalent of ⅓ unbleached all-purpose flour and ⅔ unbleached pastry flour. You may find, however, that puff pastry made with the all-purpose and cake-fl
our formula will flake or crumble a bit too much for that final cutting into serving pieces. You will be able to judge this when you cut the sheet of pastry into three strips; if it seems brittle, glaze the strips with apricot, then cut each into its final rectangles, and build the individual servings separately. It will take you a little longer, but you will avoid trouble. As with many recipes of this sort, be ready to adapt yourself to circumstances because the exact state of a baked pastry is impossible to predict.
For 16 pieces
1) Forming the puff pastry
4 baking sheets all of a size, 12 by 18 inches, approximately (or form and bake 1 pastry at a time, and use 2 baking sheets)
About 1 Tb soft butter
Chilled fresh puff pastry, either the simple dough but with 6 turns rather than 4, or the classic puff pastry
A large knife or a pastry wheel
A rotary pastry pricker, or 2 forks
(Please read Manufacturing Notes preceding this step.) Lightly butter topsides of 2 baking sheets, and bottom sides of the 2 others. Roll chilled pastry into a 14-inch rectangle, cut in half crosswise, and chill one half. Roll remaining piece rapidly into a 13- by 19-inch rectangle ⅛ inch thick; roll up on pastry pin, and unroll over one of the buttered baking sheets. Trim off ⅓ inch of pastry all around, so that the horizontal layers of dough within the puff pastry will be even at the edges.
Prick pastry all over at ⅛-inch intervals with pastry pricker or forks. Chill for at least 30 minutes to relax dough before baking. Roll and form second piece of dough in the same manner.
2) Baking the pastry—about 20 minutes at 450 degrees
Preheat oven to 450 degrees and set racks on upper- and lower-middle levels. Cover each chilled sheet of pastry dough with a buttered baking sheet, and set in the two levels of the oven. The pastry is to rise as little as possible during baking; you are to prick it again, and push down the covering sheets several times, as follows. In 5 minutes, lift covering sheets and rapidly prick pastry all over to deflate it; press covering sheets down on the pastry, and bake 5 minutes more. Rapidly prick the pastry again, and switch from one level to the other, so both will bake evenly. Prick and press pastry again in 5 minutes; it should be starting to brown. Remove covering sheets if pastry has set, and let it brown and crisp 2 to 3 minutes more, but cover again with the baking sheets if it starts to puff up—watch carefully during these last few minutes that pastry does not brown too much. At end of baking, pastry should be crisp and golden, and between ¼ and ⅜ inch thick. Remove from oven and cool 5 minutes, with the covering sheets in place to prevent pastry from curling. The pastry is now ready for cutting, next step.
(*) AHEAD-OF-TIME NOTE: Pastry is at its best when freshly baked. Use within a few hours, but you may keep it fresh in a warming oven (100–150 degrees) for a day or so; otherwise, wrap airtight and freeze.
3) Preliminaries to assembling mille-feuilles or Napoleons
apricot glaze:
1 cup apricot jam (preserves) forced through a sieve into a small saucepan
2 Tb sugar
A wooden spoon
A pastry brush
Bring strained apricot jam and sugar to the boil, stirring, for several minutes until last drops of jam to fall from spoon are sticky. Reheat to liquefy again before using.
the filling—3 to 4 cups needed:
Either one of the custard fillings in Volume I, pages 590–2, including crème pâtissière, crème Saint-Honoré, or the almond custard, frangipane;
Or crème Chantilly meringuée, the whipped cream stiffened and sweetened with an Italian meringue mixture
If needed: 1½ packages (1½ Tb) plain unfavored powdered gelatin softened in ¼ cup liquid (diluted kirsch or plain water)
Prepare one of the fillings suggested, and chill. It must hold its shape enough when spread over the pastry so that you can make layers almost ½ inch thick; if it seems too soft, strengthen it with gelatin just before using the filling as follows: sprinkle gelatin over liquid in a small saucepan; when softened, heat until completely dissolved. Let cool (or stir over ice) until almost syrupy; then fold into the filling.
icing for mille-feuilles:
About 1 cup confectioner’s sugar in a fine-meshed sieve
This is all you will need for icing mille-feuilles.
icing for Napoleons:
1 cup white fondant frosting, in a small saucepan with 2 Tb kirsch
A larger saucepan of simmering water
A wooden spoon
A rubber spatula or flexible-blade metal spatula
Just before you are to ice the assembled Napoleons, Step 4, stir fondant and kirsch over simmering water until perfectly smooth and just enough liquefied to coat spoon fairly heavily. Use at once.
1 Tb instant coffee
¼ cup water in a small saucepan with cover
8 ounces semisweet baking chocolate
A larger saucepan of simmering water to hold chocolate pan
A wooden spoon
A paper decorating cone
Dissolve coffee in water over heat; remove from heat, break up the chocolate, and stir it in. Remove pan of simmering water from heat, set chocolate pan in it, stir up, and cover pan. Set aside to melt for several minutes, then stir vigorously until perfectly smooth and creamy. Keep over warm (not hot or simmering) water until ready to use. Prepare paper cone as described and illustrated, and cut opening about ⅛ inch in diameter.
4) Assembling
NOTE: If pastry seems flaky or crumbly, cut it with a serrated knife rather than pastry wheel, using the knife like a saw. See also Manufacturing Notes, on forming individual portions rather than long strips.
Even sides and ends of pastry by trimming with pastry wheel or serrated knife. With a guide of some sort, such as a pastry sheet or a ruler, mark pastry with the point of a knife, dividing it into 3 even strips; cut through with pastry wheel or with serrated knife. Cut second pastry sheet in the same manner.
Paint top of each of the 6 strips with warm apricot glaze. Divide filling into 4 parts; spread one part on one of the glazed strips. Mount a second glazed strip upon the filled strip, and spread with its share of filling; mount a third glazed strip upon it, and set aside. Repeat with the second group of three strips. You now have two 3-layered strips ready for icing. For mille-feuilles, simply shake a heavy layer of confectioner’s sugar over each of them.
For Napoleons, rapidly spread as even a layer as possible of white fondant over each.
Stir up melted chocolate to be sure it is smooth and velvety, then pour it into your paper cone. Squeeze out lines of chocolate about 1 inch apart down the length of the fondant on each strip. Proceed immediately to next step, while chocolate is still soft.
Draw the back of a knife down across the middle of the chocolate lines, then draw another line in the opposite direction on each side, thus pulling the chocolate into a decorative pattern.
As soon as chocolate has set, in 4 to 5 minutes, but before fondant has hardened, cut the strips into crosswise pieces about 2 inches wide, using a very sharp (or saw-edged) knife, and cutting very carefully with an up-and-down sawing motion. Cut mille-feuilles in the same manner.
5) Serving
Arrange the mille-feuilles or Napoleons on a serving tray and chill an hour. Remove Napoleons from refrigerator 20 minutes before serving, so that both chocolate and fondant will regain their glossy bloom.
(*) These pastries are at their best when freshly made, although you may keep them for 2 to 3 days under refrigeration, and you may freeze them.
CORNETS ET ROULEAUX
[Cream Horns—Cream Rolls]
The cream horns and rolls of puff pastry described and illustrated are also useful for desserts. Rather than glazing them before baking, press the top and sides (not the bottom where pastry is sealed) in plain granulated or in coarse crystallized sugar.
Bake in the middle level of a preheated 425-degree oven for 15 to 20 minutes until nicely caramelized—but watch them; they burn easily. Fil
l with crème Chantilly, lightly beaten cream, sweetened and flavored with vanilla or liqueur, or with the meringue whipped cream, Chantilly meringuée, or with the custard and egg-white filling, crème Saint-Honoré, Volume I, page 591. A sprinkling of pralin, caramelized almonds or walnuts, could nicely be folded into any of these fillings.
PITHIVIERS
[Almond Cream Baked in French Puff Pastry]
The small town of Pithiviers, south of Paris halfway to Bourges, may have other distinctions, but its world renown is certainly due to the famous almond pastry that every local pâtissier prominently and proudly displays. This is an exact illustration, drawn from our own photograph of le veritable Pithiviers de Pithiviers, taken only moments before we consumed it down to the last crumb in a warm and flowering meadow just outside the town itself. This buttery, flaky, tender, marvelous dessert is probably one of the most glorious uses to which you can put puff pastry; it is also a persuasive reason for you to learn how to make your own pâte feuilletée, because a Pithiviers is so easy and fast to assemble. It is two disks of dough enclosing a lump of rum-flavored almonds, sugar, and butter; the top disk is glazed with egg just before baking, and the characteristic design is cut into it with the point of a knife. Serve the Pithiviers as a dessert, at a tea party, or on any occasion that calls for something special in the way of a sweet. One of the great white Sauternes would be lovely with it, or a sweet Champagne, or a sparkling Vouvray.