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Curly Cooks: Palmiers

Since we're all stuck inside for lockdown, many people are currently baking to pass the time, including me! So, Curly Cooks is a series on the various items that I'm making while on lockdown, most of which will carry personal stories. Today's recipe is the French Palmier.

Curly Cooks: Palmiers



Palmiers are a simple French biscuit made of puff pastry, and, like most French sweets, they are delicious. They were something I ate fairly frequently living in Paris, as they were one of the pre-made packaged goodies that were provided where I worked. Recently I was reminiscing about my time abroad and I decided that I wanted to try my hand at making some of the treats that I miss eating, just like these tasty little cookies. 

Not only are they simple in taste, but they are also super simple to make. If you use pre-made puff pastry like me, there are only two ingredients needed: the pastry, and brown sugar. Personally I don't know how to do it, but if you want to make your own puff pastry then I won't judge, I just can't help!

If you want to shake it up a bit, you can vary the filling (i.e. the sugar) depending on your personal taste. While the sugar is amazing, you could substitute in some parmesan cheese to make them savoury (although I'd recommend frozen cheese so it's easy to scatter and roll in), or cinnamon sugar for a slightly different sweet flavour. These instructions are for the original brown sugar palmiers, so let's get started. 


The first step will be rolling out the pastry. Scatter brown sugar on your work surface and then place the pastry on it, so that it doesn't stick to the table and the sugar gets pressed into the pastry. Roll it out into a rectangular shape that’s around 1cm thick, or as thin as you can make it with the sugar:

Next, scatter the top with more sugar, and then fold in the vertical edges, like so: 

Repeat this step, scattering the sugar, and then fold in the edges to the middle: 

And repeat it one more time, folding it completely in half this time so you have a long sausage-looking roll of dough:

Roll the length of pastry in the excess sugar to coat it, and then transfer it to a tray to cool in the fridge for 15-30 minutes, or until it's firm enough to cut. At this point I'd suggest turning on the oven so it preheats to 180 C.

Grab a sharp knife and cut and discard the rough edges. The roll inside should look like a tight, narrow heart shape. Cut the pastry into half cm slices and place them flat on a prepared baking sheet. 

Sprinkle the top with more sugar and press it in, and then place in the preheated oven for about 7 minutes. They will expand a fair amount very quickly, so make sure you don't put them too close together.

At this point, you should take them out and flip them, then return them to the oven for a further 7 minutes. Take them out when the biscuits are golden brown and crispy on the edges, and leave them on the baking sheet to cool. 

When they're cooled they should be thin, crispy, crunchy, perfect little heart shaped biscuits. 
It's a super easy recipe and I hope you try it and love it as much as I do.
It takes me back to my time in Paris and I want you to have a similar experience when eating them, so I'd suggest consuming them accompanied by a strong coffee.

Ingredients:

Pre-made puff pastry (I used 250g but you can use the whole 500g block for bigger/more biscuits)
Brown sugar (As much as you'd deem necessary, I'd say 2 cups is a good starting point)

Steps:

1. Prepare a tray with a baking sheet (you may need two depending on how much pastry you're using).
2. Scatter brown sugar on baking surface.
3. Roll out the puff pastry to 1cm thickness.
4. Sprinkle the pastry with 1/2 cup of brown sugar and roll it into the dough.
5. Fold in the very edges (about an inch) and sprinkle on more sugar.
6. Fold in the edges again so that the outside edges meet in the middle of the pastry sheet.
7. Sprinkle on more sugar so the top is coated and roll it out again.
8. Fold the roll of dough in half where the previous roll meets in the middle. 
9. Roll out one more time and work in leftover brown sugar to the pastry roll.
10. Chill for 15-30 mins, or until firm enough to cut.
11. Preheat oven to 180 C.
12. Take the pastry roll out of the fridge and cut it into 1cm wide slices.
13. Place the slices flat on the baking sheet and sprinkle a pinch of sugar onto each. 
14. Place in the oven for 7 minutes.
15. Remove the palmiers and flip them over, then return to the oven for a further 7 minutes.
16. When done they should be golden brown on the edges.
17. Enjoy with a cup of coffee


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