How to Cut Pastry Dough
Baking pies, cookies and specialty treats can be quite satisfying almost any time of year. You can use the dough with standard cookie cutters for shaping, or you can cut it into strips, squares, circles and rectangles. Some recipes, like flaky phyllo for fancy Mediterranean desserts, require several layers of dough. These may come in pre-cut packages or you can make it yourself. But for more standard recipes, prepare the dough and let it chill for the time recommended for your recipe -- this can take one or several hours. Then lightly dust your cutting surface with flour and roll it out. Does this Spark an idea?
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Things You'll Need
- Prepared dough
- Rolling pin
- Cutting board or clean counter surface
- Flour
- Cutting tools
Instructions
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Remove the chilled dough from the refrigerator, unwrap it from the plastic wrap or wax paper and let it stand 10 or 15 minutes at room temperature.
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Sprinkle a light coating of flour over the area where you will roll out the dough. Dust the rolling pin lightly also, then pat a little flour between your hands. Pinch the amount of dough you will need and shape it into the appropriate circle for pies or a rectangle for cookies.
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Roll the dough to about 1/4- or 1/8-inch thickness. Flip it over when about halfway done to prevent sticking and lightly re-dust the rolling pin as needed.
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Select your cookie cutters and press firmly but gently into the dough. Cut each shape and remove it to a prepared baking sheet. Stay close to the edges of each preceding cut so you waste less dough. Cut as many shapes as you can, then gather the remaining scraps and add them to the next pinch of dough and repeat.
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Cut pie crusts by turning the pie plate upside down over the rolled dough and using a sharp knife cut a circle about 2 inches wider than the circumference. Slide a spatula under the dough and flip the plate with the crust so the crust hangs over the edges. Press the dough gently into the pie plate and either pinch sections between your fingers all the way around, or cut the excess with kitchen scissors or a knife. Leave enough dough to work with if you are using two crusts as you'll need to secure them together. Lattices are made by cutting long strips about 1/2- to 1-inch wide and weaving them together over the top.
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Cut phylllo or specialty recipes into small rectangles, squares and triangles after rolling into the thinnest sheets. If you use store-bought prepared phyllo dough, sometimes you only need to slice it into halves or cut on a diagonal. When layering for baklava, many recipes call for the pastry to be cut after baking.
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Tips & Warnings
Use your imagination when making cookies and pastries -- if you're particularly artistic you can shape dough by cutting it into whatever you talents suggest.
Lightly flour cutting knives and kitchen scissors to prevent sticking, too.
If you have a lot of leftover dough, or at least enough for another batch of something, ball it up and wrap it in fresh wax paper to let chill until you need it.
Use common safety awareness when working with sharp knives, ovens and kitchen gadgets.
References
Resources
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