pastry

pastry general name for baked articles of food made of paste or having paste as a necessary ingredient. The name is also used for the paste itself. The essential elements of paste are flour, liquid (usually milk or water, sometimes beaten egg), and shortening. The making of pastry was known to the ancient Greeks and Romans, but its modern development in the Western world dates from the late 18th cent. Pastry is classed according to the amount of shortening used and the method of blending it with the flour as plain, flaky, and puff pastry. Plain pastry is used to cover meat or fruit pies; flaky pastry, which requires more shortening than plain, is used in strudels and the Turkish baklava. Puff pastry is used in the making of cream puffs and éclairs.

pastry Baked dough of flour, fat, and water. There are six basic types: shortcrust, in which the fat is rubbed into the flour; suet crust, in which chopped suet is mixed with the flour; puff and flaky, in which the fat is rolled into the dough; hotwater crust and choux, in which the fat is melted in hot water before being added to the flour (choux pastry also contains eggs and is whisked to a paste before cooking). Phyllo pastry is made from flour and water only.

Suet pastry is raised using baking powder or self‐raising flour; puff and flaky and choux pastry are raised by the steam trapped between layers of dough.

pas·try / ˈpāstrē/ • n. (pl. -tries) a dough of flour, shortening, and water, used as a base and covering in baked dishes such as pies. ∎  an item of food consisting of sweet pastry with a cream, jam, or fruit filling.