# Laminated doughs sheeter advice



## lise dale (Dec 5, 2012)

Hi, I am a pastry baker, and the job I am now working has me for the first time working with puff pastry. I know that in the past the dough had been sheeted to a thinner size than we are doing it now, and i think it would rise better if thinner, but most of the time, it's in trying to get it that last notch thinner (#3 on my sheeter) that it almost invariably wraps itself around the roller and becomes a buttery mess, unless I put far too much flour on it or it is chilled to the point that it's almost too stiff and cracks along the edges.

It seems that the girls that had been making this dough before me (and taught me) got around that by just leaving it thicker, also they made the dough far stiffer than I see on any videos I've seen, which makes it a little easier to keep cold but then it seems too stiff at times (may be a reason our puff does not puff as well as it should)

Everytime i go look at the CIA video, or others on youtube, the dough always looks so soft compared to ours, even when a sheeter is used, and they dont seem to be rushing to get it done before it warms up either, which i have to do if i make it that moist (or is it too stiff because we are just kneading it too much initially?)

Oh, the other thing is they'd told me to laminate 6 times (one a  book turn and 4 trifolds) I did the math recently and thats an awful lot of layers! I think one video said 5 times - others don't seem to specify. If there's too many layers would that be making it more likely that final thinness would be so easy to mess up?

any advice would be helpful. I have read a lot of info on the internet and the other posts on here, so no need to reexplain whats already been said, but if anything about this particular problem comes to mind id appreciate the help.

thanks

__Lise


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## foodpump (Oct 10, 2005)

Thinner won't make the dough rise up better.

Think now, what makes the dough rise?

Answer:

Steam. Water in the dough that is trapped between the fat layers.

This is why old dough or dough that has been in the freezer for months has weaker rising power than fresh dough--it's dehydrated, not enough water in it to rise properly.

All Butter dough is a (deleted) to sheet. Me personally, I take it down to 4 mm, transfer it out on a tray, shove it in the fridge for a few minutes, and then roll it out to desired thickness. Either that, or sheet small chunks at a time so the dough doesn't warm up so fast.

If the dough wraps around the rollers, then you have to take the scraper assemblies off and clean off _*all*_ the crud. If the scrapers have the slightest bit of sticky crud on them, the dough sticks to this and then bunches up before the rollers grab it and drag it through. If the belts are sticky then scrape them off with a plastic scraper--again, if the dough sticks to the belts, it will bunch up at the scraper assembly before it even enters the rollers.

Once you get down to 5 mm, go down by 1 mm or 1/2 mm increments. Why? If the dough is uneven, the high spots will hit the rollers and skew the whole sheet crooked through, and then it hits the scraper on the other side and bunches up.

Let me know if this helps...


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## dan scheitel (Jul 6, 2012)

I can sheet puff pastry out to 1.5mm on our sheeter at work. The recipe I prefer to use is from Professional Baking by Wayne Glissen

Its:

3lbs Bread Flour

1lbs Cake Flour

8oz Soft butter
1oz Salt
2lbs 4oz water

I mix this all together in the mixer for about 6 minutes on spd 2

Then for laminating, I make up a butter package with

4lbs Butter

8oz Bread Flour

I laminate this dough with 4 3-folds. 
I typically use this dough sheeted to 2mm.

It's a really wonderful recipe. And versatile to sweet our savory, you can add sugar to the dough if you so desire.

Also since you're only giving it 4 3-folds any of your puff pastry scraps can be kept, and re-layered on a tray, chilled, and re-sheeted again. However its best to use your scraps for a pastry that doesn't need such a dramatic rise.


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