We thought we would share a little bit about the history of puff pastry. If you are a French pastry lover, you probably know that a lot of pastries contain puff pastry. From croissants, made entirely of puff pastry to all the danishes, chocolate or almond croissants, Millefeuille crust, the St Honoré base: puff pastry everywhere!
So where does puff pastry come from. Well it comes from France, where it is called pâte feuilletée. It was invented in 1645 by Claudius Gele, a pastry cook apprentice. He wanted to bake an improved bread for his father who was sick and was on a diet of flour, butter and water. So, he made a bread dough and inserted butter into it. He kneaded the dough and folded it several times and then made it into a loaf.
The pastry cook had seen him make this preparation and told him not to bake the loaf because the butter would run out of it. Claudius still decided to bake it and both were pleasantly surprised at the result!
Claudius then moved to Paris and worked at the Rosabau Patisserie. He refined his invention which brought fame and fortune to the shop. Claudius then moved to Florence and worked for the brothers Mosca, who were thought to have invented puff pastry. However, Claudius always kept his recipe a secret and prepared his pastries in a locked room.
To this day, puff pastry is extremely important and constitutes a basis for a lot of French pastries. The technique is quite complicated to master and the preparation requires a lot of precision in order for the result to be ideal.
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