It finally puffed!! Puffed Pastry Tarte Tatin

I went for the stars on my first attempt on pâte feuilletée. Instead of the regular pâte feuilletée, I was overly ambitious and attempted the inversée de Pierre Herme! I'm not sure what I was thinking (or drinking) that day! It was a hot day, 80˚F outdoors (I wonder where have all the warm weather days disappeared to lately?!), my beurre sec was not truly "sec" and with
zero experience handling doughs with such high butter-to-flour content, needless to say, it was a flop. The taste was excellent, of course, how could it not be with such insane amount of butter, but the pastry just wouldn't puff!  I then retraced the steps to post-mortem my attempt: could it be the butter (I had used the European-type butter available in our local groceries)? Or could it be the long lapse time between each turn? Given all the other craziness that were going on, I had taken over 2 days in between turns and perhaps the beurrage had dried out? Or was it due to the over-handling of the dough; because of the warm temperature, I had to refrigerate the dough multiple times even in the midst of preparing for a turn. I don't have the answers, just a theory, but I guess I'd have plenty of questions for the instructor Chef when I see him or her (although I have a hunch that it'll be a "him") in pastry school!
The second attempt - a regular pâte feuilletée which turned out perfect! The dough puffed, turned wonderfully light brown and golden, its texture amazingly flaky and crisp. Even though I didn't get that shatter-to-a-million-pieces effect, the pastry was still superb. I found the regular pâte feuilletée much simpler to handle. I didn't have any problems with the consistency of the beurrage vs. detrémpe, a problem most first timers encountered, so I've read. Also, I was more focused this time round and waited only ~ 1 hour between 2 turns, except for the final turn where I had allowed the dough to rest longer. 
This is a good dough to stock in your freezer for those unexpected guests or those sudden cravings for good, flaky tarts. I didn't reduce the recipe portion and had enough puff pastry to make apricot tarts  - twice!! But I'm not interested in apricot tarts today. The pièce de résistance is - has to be - Dorie's Tarte Tatin. I'm sure the tart would taste great with a regular buttery pie dough or even with the pâte sucrée, but for me, once I've had a puffed pastry tarte tatin, there's simply no turning back! 

Making puffed pastry is not as intimidating as it seems to be and I'm sure I'll be having more pâte feuilletée encounters in pastry school. In fact, I think it may even be on my final exams! After this, I don't think I'll be buying store-bought puffed pastries ever again, especially when I learnt recently that those don't even contain any real butter! Imagine that! Chicken nuggets without chicken meat. Pastry cream without any dairy. Puffed pastry without butter. Makes one really wonder........


Pâte Feuilletée (yields about 2 1/2 pounds of pastry dough)
Source: Baking with Julia by Dorie Greenspan

Ingredients:

2-1/2 cups (12.2 oz/ 354 g) unbleached all-purpose flour
1-1/4 cups (5.0 oz/ 142 g) cake flour
1 tbsp. salt
1-1/4 cups (10 fl oz/ 300 ml) ice water
1 pound (16 oz/ 454 g) very cold unsalted butter

+ extra flour for dusting work surface

Method:

1. Put the all-purpose flour, cake flour, and salt in the work bowl of a food processor fitted with a metal blade and pulse a couple of times just to mix. 

2. Add the water all at once, pulsing until the dough forms a ball on the blade. The dough will be very moist and pliable.

3. Remove the dough from the machine, form it into a ball, with a small sharp knife, slash the top in a tic-tac-toe pattern. Wrap the dough in a damp towel and refrigerate for about 5 minutes. This is your detrémpe

4. Meanwhile, place the butter between 2 sheets of plastic wrap and beat it with a rolling pin until it flattens into a square that's about 1" thick. Take care that the butter remains cool and firm: if it has softened or become oily, chill it before continuing.

5. Unwrap the detrémpe and place it on a work surface dusted with all-purpose flour. With your rolling pin, press on the dough to flatten it and then roll it into a 10" square. Keep the top and bottom of the dough well floured to prevent sticking and lift the dough and move it around frequently. 

6. Starting from the center of the square, roll out over each corner to create a thick center pad with "ears," or flaps.

7. Place the cold butter in the middle of the dough and fold the ears over the butter, stretching them as needed so that they overlap slightly and encase the butter completely. If you have to stretch the dough, stretch it from all over. Don't just pull the ends. You should now have a package that is 8" square.

Keep the dough cold at all times.

First turn:

8. Gently but firmly press the rolling pin against the top and bottom edges of the square. Then, keeping the work surface and the top of the dough well floured to prevent sticking, roll the dough into a rectangle that is three times as long as the square you started with, about 24". With this first roll, it is particularly important that the butter be rolled evenly along the length and width of the rectangle; check when you start rolling that the butter is moving along well, and roll a bit harder or more evenly, if necessary, to get a smooth, even dough-butter sandwich. With a pastry brush, brush off the excess flour from the top of the dough, and fold the rectangle up from the bottom and down from the top in thirds, like a business letter, brushing off the excess flour. You have completed one turn.

Second turn:

9. Rotate the dough so that the closed fold is to your left, like the spine of a book. Repeat the rolling and folding process, rolling the dough to a length of 24" and then folding it in thirds.

10. If the dough is still cool and no butter is oozing out, you can give the dough another two turns now. If the dough is too soft, wrap it in plastic wrap and refrigerate it for at least 30 minutes. Each time you refrigerate the dough, mark the number of turns you've completed by indenting the dough with your fingertips. It is best to refrigerate the dough for 30 to 60 minutes between each set of two turns.

10. The total number of turns needed is six. You can give the dough just four turns, chill it overnight, and do the last two turns the next day. You should plan to chill the dough for at least an hour before cutting or shaping it.

Here's the link to Dorie's splendid Tarte Tatin but folks, take my word for it, use puffed pastry. Your tarte tatin will taste out of this world!