Happy New Year 2020! Yes, I know, I always start the year giving excuses over and over because I haven’t stopped by my gourmand writing corner in a very long time. Then, I make promises once and again that I can’t keep for one or another reason. It seems I haven’t written since… March, apparently. I have only posted on Instagram, I confess. So, in order for me to resume good customs and share my writing once again, I will start this time with a little bit of butter and the sweetness needed just before finding another good excuse for getting together and sit around our table at home to taste something good.
Today we are celebrating Epiphany, and yes, everywhere around the World we gather as families to cut different versions of galettes, brioches, crowns, etc. looking for the lucky charm which will crown us as the King of the Party, or like at home in Mexico, the Baby Jesus figurine which makes us the godparent for the Candlemas Feast on February 2.
Well, the version I am presenting you today will be extremely easy, since even when you can do your own puff pastry at home, it is something that takes time, but there is always the option to go get some ready to use puff pastry at the store. It’s just a matter of choosing what to do.
Equipment
Ingredients
For the Puff Pastry:
- 250 g (2 cups) flour, all-purpose
- 100 g (7 tbsp) butter, unsalted
- 100 ml (½ cup) water
- 4 g (1 tsp) salt
- 100 g (7 tbsp) butter, if possible, dry pastry butter
For the Almond Cream:
- 60 g (4 tbsp) butter, unsalted
- 60 g (½ cup) almond flour
- 60 g (⅓ cup) granulated sugar
- 1 (1) egg
- 1 pinch (1 pinch) vanilla
To Finish:
- 1 (1) egg, for the egg wash
- 10 ml (2 tsp) water
- 60 g (⅓ cup) granulated sugar
- 60 ml (¼ cup) water
To Prepare
The Puff Pastry:
- Prepare your détrempe: Mix the all-purpose flour, sea salt, butter, and water in a large bowl to obtain a homogeneous dough. Mark a cross with a knife and cover with cling film and keep in the refrigerator for approximately 30 minutes.
- Butter: Take the dough out of the fridge and flatten it, but keep the center a little bulky (thicker). Place the butter previously flattened and shaped into a rectangle in the center of the dough. Wrap the butter with the dough as if it were an envelope. Turn it around and flour it.
- Turn (6 times): Extend the dough in the shape of a rectangle for the size to be 3 times longer than its width. Turn the dough 90° to place it horizontally and fold it in thirds; first the right side and then the left side. Cover the dough and cool in the fridge for about 30 minutes keeping the same sense as when it is folded and put in the fridge. Take it out and extend the rectangle again, pivot the dough horizontally and fold again; right, then left. Cover and put in the refrigerator for an hour. Carry on until the dough has 6 simple turns like these ones.
The Almond Cream:
- Cream the butter with the granulated sugar in a bowl with a whisk or with a mixer at medium speed.
- Add the vanilla, the almond flour and the egg previously beat. Mix everything.
Assembly:
- Prepare your egg wash: Mix the egg with the water and pass it through a strainer for a silky texture in the mix.
- Cut the puff pastry in two and extend the two pieces to have 2 squares of about 1/8 in. thick each.and which will allow us to cut circles of a diameter of about 8 in. each.
- Delicately mark a 6 in. diameter circle with a tart/cake mold in the center of one of the squares. Then, with a pastry bag and a medium tip (#12) make a serpentine from the center of the circle with the almond cream.
- Apply a little water with a pastry brush all around the almond cream serpentine to paste the second puff pastry square on top. Gently press the dough with your tart/cake mold and cut with the tip of a knife petals which will make the galette look like a sun.
- Finally with the spine of the knife, trace the decor all around the galette.
- Apply the egg wash, but pay attention so that it doesn’t drip.
- Let it rest in the refrigerator for about 20 minutes.
Baking:
- Preheat your oven at 425 °F (220 °C approx.) and bake until golden brown.
- In the meantime, mix the water and the sugar and heat the mix to make a syrup. Set it aside.
- Once your galette is ready, take it out of the oven and brush it with the syrup and put it in the oven for 5 more minutes.
- Take out of the oven and let it cool on a rack.
