Makes about 500g (1lb 2oz)
Ingredients:
225g (8oz) plain flour, sifted, plus extra to dust
½tsp salt
225g (8oz) unsalted butter, chilled
125-150ml (4-5fl oz) ice cold water
1. Put flour and salt in a large mixing bowl and add 25g (1oz) of butter, cut into cubes. Toss butter through flour with a knife, to coat cubes. Rub butter and flour together using fingertips until mixture resembles breadcrumbs.
2. Pour in 125ml (4fl oz) ice cold water and stir it in quickly using knife, to bring everything together to a rough dough. Add a little more of water if needed. Bring dough together using your hands. Knead lightly on work surface and shape into a thick rectangle. Wrap in cling film and chill for 30min.
3. Lightly flour work surface. Roll out pastry into a long rectangle about 30.5cm x 15cm (12in x 6in). Straighten up sides now and again with edges of a palette knife and try to keep top and bottom edges as square as possible.
4. Wrap remaining butter in greaseproof paper. Using a rolling pin, flatten into a rectangle, about half size of rolled out dough and slightly narrower. Lay butter on bottom half of dough.
5. Fold sides and bottom of pastry just over butter, then fold top half of pastry over butter to enclose it. Press edges with a rolling pin to seal and use a palette knife to make sure edges and corners are straight and sharp.
6. Lightly press dough with rolling pin to flatten slightly. Roll pastry out again into a rectangle, using a palette knife and rolling pin to keep edges straight and neat. Fold bottom third into middle, then fold top third over, to seal like an envelope. Roll and fold again, with closed fold to left, like a book. Wrap in cling film and chill for 30min
7. Repeat process of rolling and folding twice, then chill for 30min. Repeat this roll, fold and chill sequence another two times. After six rolls and folds pastry should not be streaky and there shouldn’t be any butter showing through – if there is, give pastry just one more roll and fold.8 Chill finished pastry for 30min, or ideally overnight, before using.
Use your skills to make these triple-tested recipes:
Minted lamb puff pastry recipe
Veggie puff pizza recipe
Best puff pastry recipes inspired by the GBBO
Classic glass bowl (0.5 / 1 litre), Classic glass measure jug (1 litre), Pyrex. Loft 24-piece dinner set, Zwilling J.A. Henckels. Palette knife, glass ramekin, measuring spoon, rolling pin, chef's own.
| Love food? Want to tailor your cooking skills further? Check out the courses at the Good Housekeeping Institute SHOP NOW |
An experienced and highly skilled team of food writers, stylists and digital content producers, the Good Housekeeping Cookery Team is a close-knit squad of food obsessives. Cookery Editor Emma Franklin is our resident chilli obsessive and barbecue expert, who spends an inordinate amount of time on holidays poking round the local supermarkets seeking out new and exciting foods. Senior Cookery Writer Alice Shields is a former pastry chef and baking fanatic who loves making bread and would have peanut butter with everything if she could. Her favourite carb is pasta, and our vibrant green spaghetti is her weeknight go-to. Lover of all things savoury, Senior Cookery Writer Grace Evans can be found eating crispy corn and nocellara olives at every opportunity, and will take the cheeseboard over dessert any time (though she cannot resist a slice of tres leches cake). With a wealth of professional kitchen know-how, culinary training and years of experience between them, they are all dedicated to ensuring every Good Housekeeping recipe is the best it can be, so you can trust they’ll work (and if they don’t – we’ll have the answer for why*) every time (*90% of the time the answer is: “buy an separate oven thermometer”!).
