Essential Pastry Tools and Baking Tools for Making Puff Pastry at Home #PastryRecipesWorldwide

James Lyndona is a certified interior designer and runs his own interior decoration consultancy. James especially loves decorating a home in wooden furniture and believes that nothing gives a home as warm and cozy a touch as all-wood furniture and decor. James loves reading up on new design ideas, and has a special interest in space saving techniques.




Essential Pastry Tools and Baking Tools for Making Puff Pastry at Home

Whether you wish to make puff pastry for desserts or savory dishes, it's easy to make at home with the right pastry tools and baking tools. Here's a list of essential tools for pastry and tips to choose them.

Pastry Blender or Cutter

These pastry tools are also called pastry knives and they are essential for "cutting" or combining butter or shortening into pastry flour. The cold butter pieces have to be distributed evenly through the flour before kneading the pastry dough. After mixing, kneading and rolling, the butter creates pockets of fat in the dough. While baking, the butter melts and releases steam which makes the pastry flaky and delicate.

These baking tools have a series of curved blades which are attached to the handle. These blades are pushed through butter and flour to combine them so choose pastry cutters that are sturdy and well-constructed. For better handling and control while blending butter, pastry blenders with easy-grip handles are a good choice.

Pastry Board

Puff pastry needs a lot of folding over to create the flaky layers and pastry boards are helpful pastry tools for this activity. Choose boards made from wood as they are easy to handle and store than marble boards. Wooden pastry boards that come with marked measurements such as circles for making pie crusts and a ruler are an excellent choice. Opt for a board with a non-slip mat to keep it stable while working.

Rolling Pins and Brushes

Rolling pins and brushes are essential baking tools for making puff pastry. Rolling pins come in all shapes and sizes and in different materials. Wooden ones are the best choice as they are lightweight and easy to handle. Longer pins are ideal as they are useful for rolling puff party and pie crusts. Pastry brushes are essential for applying an egg wash or a butter wash while baking puff pastry.

These pastry tools are versatile. Rolling pins can be used to crumble crackers for crust while pastry brushes can be used for basting and glazing meats. Choose baking tools that are dishwasher-safe to save time and effort while making puff pastry from scratch.

Use these tools to make flaky, multi-layered and delicate puff pastry at home.

Why Do You Call This Roll Brazo de Mercedez? #PastryRecipesWorldwide

Photo Source:Brazo de Mercedez by Gloss Girl, on Flickr

Why Do You Call This Roll Brazo de Mercedez?

What is a Brazo? A Mercedez? Well, others say, a brazo means a hand and Mercedez, a name of beautiful lady living in the woods alone, baking bread daily, and hoping that someday, a male stranger will pass by to eat her soft bread, form into a roll with sweet filling.

Ingredients:

For the filling:
1 cup sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
8 egg yolks

For the meringue:
8 egg whites
1 teaspoon cream of tartar
1 cup sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla

Procedures:

1 Make the filling: Combine ingredients in a bowl and cook on a double boiler until thick. Set aside.

2 Make the meringue: Preheat oven to 400ºF.

3 Using an electric mixer, beat egg whites and cream of tartar until soft peaks form. Slowly add the sugar and vanilla. Continue to beat until stiff.

4 Spread meringue on an oiled baking sheet lined with parchment paper. Bake until lightly brown.

5 Invert on parchment paper that has been sprinkled with sugar. Spread filling while meringue is still warm. Roll the meringue like a jelly roll.

6. Serves 12 persons.

The Perfectly Frosted Cake #PastryRecipesWorldwide

Resource: Theresa Happe is a baker, cake decorator and co-creator of CakesWeBake.com, a social network for cake decorating where you will find thousands of cake photos, cake decorating videos, a live chat and forum.


The Perfectly Frosted Cake

When you start out cake decorating, tackling the buttercream can be frustrating. If the icing isn't smooth, it affects the whole look of the cake. While it does take some practice to get it down pat, there are a few things you can do to get better results.

Chill the cake before you start frosting. A warm cake is more apt to break apart. Chill before and after filling it. Often, if you frost the cake right after you fill it, later on the filling will bulge out of the middle of the cake. By chilling first, the cake has time to settle and anything that wants to squeeze out of the sides can be smoothed with the spatula.

It's very helpful to use a lazy suzan. It allows you to turn the cake continuously while icing so you have fewer lines from stopping and starting again. One way to ice to apply a crumb coat. This can either be a thin coat of butter cream or an apricot glaze. To use an apricot glaze, thin apricot jam with hot water and press it through a strainer. Then brush it on the cake with a pastry brush. Chill it and give it time to firm up.

A quick way to get the icing on the cake is to use a large cake decorating tip to pipe it all over the cake before spreading it. The #789 Wilton cake decorating tip works great for this. It's such a big tip that you'll need to devote a cake decorating bag to it because the hole is much too big to hold a coupler. Once you cut the hole, just drop the tip right into the bag. If you're not using this tip then carefully place the icing on the side of the cake and push from the middle of the icing outward. You don't want to drag the spatula across the cake. That pulls crumbs into the icing and can tear the cake. Medium consistency buttercream works best. If it's too thin, it will slide off the cake. Too thick and it will tear the cake and be very difficult to spread.

Hold the tip so the lines are facing the cake. Pipe a line around the base of the cake. Move up and pipe another line around. Continue until you get to the top but let the icing go a little bit above the top. (This helps you create a nice edge to the cake). Smooth the sides with either a metal spatula, a bowl scraper or a spackle knife by holding it vertically and at a 45 degree angle to the cake. Spread while turning the lazy suzan. Scrape off the excess icing. Repeat until the sides look pretty even.

Now pipe icing on the top of the cake. With your spatula, pull the icing from the edge towards the middle of the cake, scraping off the excess icing as you go. Once you've done this to the entire top of the cake, hold the spatula flat against the cake and pull it straight across from one end to the other. If icing sticks out off of the edges, carefully scrape it away with the spatula.

Not every type of butter cream crusts. If you do use crusting butter cream, you can do the next step to get the icing really smooth. Let the cake sit for at least 15 minutes. Touch the icing and see if it's hardened. If it comes off on your finger, wait a little longer. Now, take either a Viva paper towel (patterned paper towels won't work for this), wax paper or parchment paper and lay it on the side of the cake. Use the spatula again to smooth across the paper towel a few times. Move the paper towel to the next spot and repeat. Do this to the entire cake. The wax paper and parchment paper don't bend as easily but they will still work.

Delicious Tiramisu Recipes #PastryRecipesWorldwide

Delicious Tiramisu Recipes

Tiramisu recipes are usually high flavored with espresso and gives the great Italian taste. Tiramisu is an Italian favorite dessert that you can create inside your own house to produce deep espresso flavors within this traditional dessert.

The meaning of tiramisu is "pick-me-up" in Italian because it includes the energy and caffeine explicitly as a result of the utilization of espresso. Tiramisu has diverse stories on the topic of its origin, but it is principally composed of a layered cake containing espresso as extra flavor. Some people state that tiramisu introduced in Tuscany, which also is the habitat of another layered Italian dessert. It has been noticed that layered cakes are extremely cherished in Italian cuisine that is why Tiramisu is derived.

Tiramisu is a great combination of espresso, chocolate, and zabaglione cream that offers intense and dark flavors. The traditional tiramisu involve ladyfingers dipped in intense combination of expresso that offers unique caffeine flavor to the dessert. The fundamental recipe for this dessert typically use raw eggs, and it also comprises of bitter cocoa powder to impart a different aroma to the palate.

Espresso is a drink that is notable in Italian cuisine, where it is prepared with genuine Italian elegance. This is particularly why espresso is included in this admired Italian dessert to present it a richer feel and also bring out the creamy flavor as an outcome. Many people do not like the essence of coffee in their dessert recipes, but on the other hand, there are various people who have been enjoying tiramisu for years without even realizing that it contains espresso!

If you are searching for a conventional Italian dessert that does offer real espresso essence, then tiramisu is the well-suited preparation to begin. The encrusted cake is the most distinguished feature of the tiramisu recipes. The delightful supplement to the layered cake is the mixture of cream with espresso seasoned ladyfingers. Tiramisu recipes are at all times relished at all times.

For innovative or typical tiramisu recipes, look for the world wide web. So move forward and have a sweet sensation with genuine Italian dessert.

Recipe: Serves 8 to 10

For the chiffon cake
1/3 cup vegetable oil
4 egg yolks
1/2 cup water
1 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 tablespoons coffee powder
1 3/4 cups cake flour
1 3/4 cups sugar
2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
4 egg whites

For the syrup
1 1/3 tablespoons granulated instant coffee
1 1/3 tablespoons white sugar
1 cup water
1/3 cup rum

For the filling
1/2 bar cream cheese, softened
1/2 cup white sugar
2 egg yolks
2 1/2 cups whipping cream
2 tablespoons ground espresso

Procedures:

1 Line 2 (9-inch) cake pans with baking paper. You can also grease and flour the bottom of the pan but not the sides. (How to line and grease a pan? Click here.)

2 Whip the vegetable oil and the egg yolks together just until combined. Stir in the water, vanilla extract and coffee powder.

3 Sift together the cake flour, 1/3 of the sugar, the baking powder, and the salt. Stir this into the egg yolk mixture then whip at high speed for 1 minute. Set aside.

4 Whip the egg whites to a foam. Gradually add the remaining sugar and continue whipping until stiff peaks form.

5 Carefully fold the meringue into the reserved batter. Divide the batter between the prepared pans.

6 Bake at 375°F for approximately 25 minutes or until the cake springs back when pressed lightly in the center.

7 Invert the pans on a rack and allow the cakes to cool in the pans before unmolding.

8 Make the syrup. Dissolve coffee powder and white sugar in 1/3 cup warm water. Add the remaining water and rum. Mix well and set aside.

9 Make the filling by beating the softened cream cheese, sugar and egg yolks until thick and creamy, about 10 minutes in a mixer on medium speed.

10 In a separate mixing bowl, whip the cream until soft peaks form. Gradually add the cream cheese mixture until well incorporated. Be careful not to over mix.

11 To assemble: Split each cake in half. Brush one cake with coffee syrup then spread about 1/2 cup filling. Repeat this procedure until all the cake layers have been used up and covered with the filling. Spread remaining filling to cover the sides of the cake. Sift ground espresso powder on top and decorate with coffee beans.

Notes:

(1) Most tiramisu recipes call for coffee liquor, but a bottle of rum is a great and cheaper alternative.

(2) To save time, you can use ladyfingers instead of making chiffon cake from scratch, or you can buy ready-made chiffon slices from your favorite bakeshop.

How To Make Sticky Buns With Cinnamon #PastryRecipesWorldwide

A tasty way of making sticky buns with cinnamon as added flavor to this pastry recipe. You can top nuts of your choice; walnuts, cashew nuts, etc.

Ingredients:

Dough:

• 1/4 cup warm water (105° to 115°)
• 1 (1/4-ounce) package active dry yeast
• 1/3 cup sugar
• 3/4 cup milk
• 4 Tbsp. unsalted butter, plus more for greasing
• 3 large egg yolks
• 1 Tbsp. finely grated orange zest
• 1 1/4 teaspoon. salt
• 4 to 4 1/4 cups all-purpose flour, plus more for dusting

Filling:

• 1/2 cup firmly packed light brown sugar
• 1 Tbsp. ground cinnamon
• 4 Tbsp. unsalted butter

Topping:

• 3/4 cup firmly packed light brown sugar
• 4 Tbsp. unsalted butter
• 3 Tbsp. honey
• 1 Tbsp. light corn syrup
• 1 1/2 cups (6 ounces) coarsely chopped pecans

Procedures:

1 Make the dough. In the bowl of an electric mixer, combine warm water, yeast and 1 tsp. sugar. Stir to dissolve and let sit until foamy, about 5 minutes.

Add milk, butter, remaining sugar, egg yolks, orange zest, salt and 3 cups flour. Mix on low speed until blended. Switch to a dough hook and then, again on low speed, slowly incorporate the remaining 1 cup of flour. Increase speed to medium, kneading dough until smooth and slightly sticky (adding a little more flour if too wet), 3 to 5 minutes. Shape the dough into a ball and place in a large, buttered bowl. Turn dough over in bowl to coat with the butter from the bowl. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap. Let rise in a warm place until doubled in volume, about 1 hour (or 2 hours if not in an entirely warm place). After the dough has risen, punch down. Turn out onto a lightly floured cutting board and let sit 20 minutes.

2 Make the filling. Combine brown sugar and cinnamon in a small bowl. Melt butter; keep separate.

3 Roll dough out into a 12" x 18" rectangle. Brush with melted butter and sprinkle with cinnamon-sugar mixture. Starting with the long side, roll dough into a cylinder. Place seam side down on a flat surface and cut crosswise into 15 slices.

4 Make the topping. In a 1-quart saucepan, combine brown sugar, butter, honey and corn syrup over low heat; stir until sugar and butter are melted. Pour mixture into a greased 9" x 13" pan and sprinkle pecans on top.

5 Place dough slices, flat side down, on top of prepared topping. Crowd them so they touch. Cover with plastic wrap, leaving room for the buns to rise, and refrigerate overnight.

6 Remove the rolls from the refrigerator and let stand at room temperature while the oven pre-heats. Preheat oven to 375°. Bake buns until golden, 30 to 35 minutes. Remove pan from oven and immediately (and carefully as not to spill hot topping on your toes!) invert onto a serving tray or baking dish. Let buns cool slightly and serve warm.