Lorraine Pascale Quick Bread Food

SAVORY AND SWEET SHORT PASTRY

Steps:

• Put the flour and butter in a food processor and blitz to bread crumbs. If using your hands, rub the butter and flour together until the mixture resembles fine bread crumbs. Add the egg yolks (and if making sweet pastry, the sugar) and a pinch of salt and stir together with a knife. Squidge the mixture together into a ball. If the pastry feels very dry add the water (or if making sweet pastry, the cream or milk), but try and get by without for a more tender pastry.
• Once the pastry is all squidged together, pop it in the refrigerator to rest for 30 minutes.
• After 30 minutes, remove it from the refrigerator and let it warm up a little (if you use it straight from the refrigerator and try to roll it out, the pastry will just be a hopeless crumbly mess). Roll the pastry out on a lightly floured board and use as required.

PUFF PASTRY

Steps:

• Put the flour, salt, and chilled butter into a large bowl and rub them together with your fingertips until they resemble fine bread crumbs. Make a well in the center of the mixture and pour in the water. Mix with a knife, then bring the dough together with your hands.
• Squidge into a ball, then wrap in plastic wrap and put in the refrigerator for 25 minutes.
• Unwrap the dough ball and use a knife to score a large cross in the middle of it, cutting no more than halfway through. Lift all four corners from the middle of the cross, then pull them up and out to make the cross big enough to put the softened butter into.
• Add the butter, then fold the corners of the cross back to the center, covering the butter so it is completely enclosed. The corners should overlap in the center so no butter is showing. It is important that the butter is not too hard or too soft, otherwise it will escape through the dough when you roll it out and the resulting pastry will not rise as well. If it's too hard, let the ball of pastry stand at room temperature until the butter inside has softened; if it is getting too soft, pop it in the refrigerator for 20 minutes to firm up a little before rolling.
• This next process is called "rolling and folding" (or "turns") and it creates the characteristic flaky layers of puff pastry. Begin by rolling the pastry out away from you on a well-floured counter to a rectangle roughly 3 times as long as it is wide (don't turn the pastry when rolling). Keep the corners square and edges straight by pressing a spatula or rule against them. Lift the dough occasionally to make sure it isn't sticking; flour the counter again if necessary and sprinkle with more flour as you go, dusting away any excess with a pastry brush. Take the short edge of the pastry nearest to you and fold it up a third, then fold the top edge down a third to give a rectangular block. Turn the dough 90 degree and then repeat the rolling and folding.
• You have now given the dough two "rolls and folds." Wrap the dough in plastic wrap and put in the refrigerator. Chill for 20 minutes.
• Remove the dough from the refrigerator, then unwrap and give it two more "rolls and folds." Wrap and rest in the refrigerator for at least another 20 minutes. The block of puff pastry can at this point be kept in the refrigerator for a day or two, or frozen.
• Remove from the refrigerator, then unwrap and give the dough a final couple of rolls and folds. Roll it out to the size desired for your chosen recipe. Place on a baking sheet, then cover with oiled plastic wrap and let rest in the refrigerator for about 30 minutes before using.

RASPBERRY & BANANA NO-KNEAD BREAKFAST LOAF

Steps:

• Preheat the oven to 350°F and line an 8 1/2 x 4-inch loaf pan with baking parchment. I make sure that the paper overlaps a little bit, which makes it much easier to remove the loaf from the pan once it is cooked.
• Cream the butter and sugar together in a large bowl until nicely combined. Add the eggs in two batches, beating well between each addition. The mixture won't quite look its best, but it will soon come good! Add the whole wheat flour, all-purpose flour and baking powder and stir through until nicely mixed in. Then stir the bananas in, followed by a gentle fold in of the raspberries.
• Pour the mixture into the loaf pan, smooth it out a bit with the back of a spoon and then sprinkle the oats evenly over the top. Bake in the oven for 50-55 minutes or until a skewer comes out clean when the loaf is pierced in the center.
• Leave to cool in the pan for a few minutes before lifting out and leaving to cool completely on a wire rack. The loaf will stay at its best for 1 to 2 days when stored in an airtight container.