Flaky Pastry Egg Tarts

 When my friend, Peng, linked me a video about a hong kong grandpa retiring and teaching his grand daughter to make his famous flaky pastry egg tart, i remembered that i have also made the flaky pastry this way but have not posted cos i have been neglecting my blog, but this recipe will be lost if not shared.  All flaky recipes have been following the western way of layering by wrapping the butter dough with the less butter dough(the chinese called this the water dough and the butter dough, oil dough), but for this egg tart, it is the other way round, the water dough is wrapped by the oil dough.  It is really flaky and easy to roll.  I have used the traditional ingredient - LARD but vegetable shortening can be used.  LARD  is available in 1 lb block in all our supermarkets and it is inexpensive.  Follow my instructions and you will have perfect flaky egg tarts.



Ingredients:

A
Oil Dough:

65 gm low gluten flour/cake flour
100 gm lard/shortening
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp butter flavored oil

B
Water Dough:

15 gm sugar
10 gm lard
1/4 tsp butter flavored oil
45 gm water
65 gm low gluten flour/cake flour

Method:

Using a hand mixer, beat ingredient A(Oil Dough) until well mixed.

Remove on to a plastic wrap and shape it into flat rectangle.

Using the same bowl, beat ingredients B with the hand mixer until well mixed, scrape the sides of the bowl now and then.

Remove on to counter top, dust with bench flour, knead it slightly until pliable.  Shape it flat to about the size of the oil dough

Open up the plastic wrap of the oil dough and place the water dough on top of the oil dough.

Use more bench flour if it is too sticky.and place a piece of parchment paper on top.

Roll gently into a thin layer rectangle(it will be messy in the beginning but it will be nice and perfect after all the folding and rolling).  While rolling, make sure that the base is not stuck, use more bench flour if you have to.

Fold the 2 sides in so the they meet in the center of rectangle - this is called a book fold

Repeat rolling out into a rectangle and book fold another 2 more times.  All together 3 x book fold.  Do not fold more than 3 times.    

After 3 book folds, roll the dough into a thin rectangle with  1/8 inch thickness.

Using a fluted cookie cutter which is approximately the same size of your egg tart mold, cut rounds.

Place a round on to the egg tart mold and using your thumb to push the round dough up the sides of the mold until it is slightly higher, making sure not to puncture the dough.  Even pressure is required so that the sides are of even thickness to ensure perfect egg tart.

Repeat until all the dough has been used up.

Wrap these dough filled molds with plastic wrap and leave in airtight container in the fridge, OVERNIGHT.  The dough has to be VERY VERY COLD or else it will shrink and the egg mixture will overflow.

PREPARE THE EGG FILLING

Ingredients

55 gm sugar
1/4 tsp egg yolk yellow coloring
100 gm warm water
2 large eggs
80 gm whole/evaporated milk
70 gm heavy cream
1/2 tsp vanilla extract

Method

Mix sugar, yellow coloring and warm water until sugar dissolves.

Lightly beat 2 eggs, then add in milk, heavy cream and vanilla extract.  Stir until combined.

Add in the sugar mixture and pass through a fine sieve.


TO BAKE THE EGG TARTS

Place oven rack to the lowest rung of the oven

Preheat oven 425f convection.

Remove the chilled dough from the fridge and place onto baking tray.

Fill the chilled molds with the egg mixture to about 90 % full.

Place to bake for 18 to 20 minutes (check at 15 minutes and move around the egg tarts as some might be more browned or the egg filling has been cooked, ovens are known for uneven heat.)  The egg tarts are ready when the sides of pastry is slight browned and the egg filling is still jiggling.

Remove and let cool on cake rack,  When slight cooled, egg tart can be removed from tart molds.

Enjoy