Shortbread dough for pies and cookies. How to prepare the perfect shortbread dough according to the recipe, beneficial properties and harms Butter shortbread dough for cakes, cookies, sweet pies

Delicate and crumbly products are obtained from shortcrust pastry, but only if it is mixed correctly. To prevent cookies or cakes from being hard, you need to know some of the intricacies of making shortcrust pastry. We'll talk about this below.
Recipe contents:

Products made from shortcrust pastry always turn out crumbly, because... contain a lot of fat, like butter or margarine. This is exactly what it is distinctive feature dough, which is why it is called shortbread. It is prepared easily and quickly, the main thing is to follow certain rules.

Secrets of making shortcrust pastry

• So, the first secret is the temperature of the ingredients. The butter should be cold and firm, not frozen. Other foods should also be kept at a cold temperature.
• The crumbly effect will only be achieved thanks to a large amount of oil. Therefore, there is no need to feel sorry for him.
• The flour needs to be sifted and rubbed with butter until it reaches the consistency of crumbs. It is important! The fat coats the flour. Gluten in flour combines with moisture and creates crunch, crumbliness and softness, rather than elasticity.
• Keep the proportion of flour and butter - 1:2. Then there will be a pleasant result.
• The dough is kneaded by hand and not for long. Otherwise, the butter will melt, which will prevent the products from coming out tender and soft.
• It is easier to roll out the dough after cooling for half an hour in the refrigerator. It will compress and shrink.
• The products are baked in a preheated oven at 180-200 degrees.

• See the recipe -

• Calorie content per 100 g - 314 kcal.
• Number of servings - 700-800 g
• Preparation time: 15 minutes for kneading, 30 minutes for cooling

Ingredients:

• Flour - 500 g
• Eggs - 1 pc.
• Butter - 250 g
• Sugar - 1 tbsp.
• Salt - a pinch
• Baking soda- 1 tsp.

Step-by-step preparation of shortcrust pastry:

1. Butter cold temperature, not frozen, cut into pieces.

2. Combine the butter with the flour sifted through a sieve.

3. Using a knife, quickly cut in the flour to form fine flour crumbs. Add soda, salt and sugar and continue moving the knife so that the products are evenly distributed.

4. Make a small well in the flour crumbs and crack the egg into it.

5. Stir the mixture with a fork or knife so that the egg is evenly distributed throughout the mixture.

6. Knead the dough with quick movements, gathering it into a lump. Here, in fact, you don’t need to knead anything, just rake the dough from the edges to the middle, forming it into one whole “ball”.

7. Wrap the dough in plastic and refrigerate for half an hour, or better yet, an hour. The dough can be kept in the refrigerator for 1-2 days. It can also be frozen for up to 3 months.
After a certain time, you can start baking cookies, pastries, pies. But keep in mind that since the dough contains a large amount of fat, the board and rolling pin for rolling must be chilled, so I recommend keeping them in the refrigerator for some time in advance. It is also important to roll out the dough very quickly, because... it must not be allowed to warm up.

Note: the dough can be given a special taste and aroma. To do this, vanilla sugar, grated lemon or orange zest, crushed chocolate, cocoa powder, ground or chopped nuts, cinnamon, etc. are added to the composition. Additives should be added when kneading the dough and cooled with them in the refrigerator.

All this can be done from shortcrust pastry. This dough is one of the simplest to prepare, but it also has its secrets. Properly mixed shortcrust pastry has a very crumbly, crispy structure and simply melts in your mouth.

Depending on the composition shortbread dough divided into types. By classic recipe it is prepared on the basis of a mixture of fat and flour with the addition of large quantity water. Most often used as fat butter. The more fat in the dough, the more crumbly it is. If in the classic version you replace the water with an egg, you get , and if you replace it with sour cream, then sour cream. Also as additional components in shortcrust pastry you can add boiled potatoes, or. For flavor, it is often added to shortbread dough. vanilla or, cardamom or nutmeg.

Shortbread dough is kneaded in two ways:

Grind butter (cold) into crumbs with dry ingredients, add water (egg or sour cream), mix everything very quickly until a dough forms and cool.

Mix butter (room temperature) with sugar until it is completely dissolved, add egg and flour.

50 g sugar (preferably powdered sugar)

100 g butter

150 g flour

1 yolk

A pinch of salt

Some tips for making shortcrust pastry

The most important thing you need to know is that shortbread dough cannot be kneaded for a long time. You need to knead it very quickly so that the fat that is included in its composition does not melt, otherwise products made from such dough will be tough after baking.

It is better to knead shortbread dough in a cool room, and before kneading it is better to hold your hands under cold water for several minutes.

The fat for kneading the dough must be chilled, but not taken from the freezer. Most often, a 2:1 proportion of flour and fat is used to knead shortcrust pastry.

To make the dough crispier, use powdered sugar instead of sugar, and use only yolks instead of whole eggs.

After kneading, the dough must be refrigerated for at least 1 hour. To do this, it is advisable to slightly flatten the dough into a layer, this way it will cool more evenly, and after cooling the dough will be easier to roll out.

Shortbread dough should be rolled out to a thickness of 4 to 8 mm.

There is no need to grease the pans and baking sheets, since shortbread dough does not stick due to the large amount of fat in it.

Shortbread dough products are baked at temperatures from 180 to 220 C.

After baking, the finished products should be allowed to cool, since when hot they are very fragile and can easily break.

Also often used for baking open pies. blind baking method. First they bake the dough base, and then fill it with filling and bake it all together. To ensure that the dough base does not lose its shape during baking, the dough is placed tightly in the mold, pricked with a fork, a piece of foil or parchment is placed on top of the dough and covered with beans or peas and baked in this form for about 15 minutes (after baking, the beans or peas are no longer suitable for cooking , but you can leave it and always use it when baking). Next, the dough base is filled with filling and the whole pie is baked.

If the shortcrust pastry pie is closed, then small holes must be made in the top layer of dough to allow steam to escape.

Delicious baking and bon appetit!

This is an intermediate option between shortcrust pastry and puff pastry. It is crumbly but firm, making it suitable as a base for large pies and quiches.

In a recipe, you can add the word “cold” before each ingredient and item, and this should not be neglected. The water should be ice cold and the oil should be rock hard. It's a good idea to keep bowls, knives and even the board on which you will work with the dough in the freezer. It is better to move the cutting table away from the radiator or open the window.

The secret of shortcrust pastry is in oil. It is thanks to him that the baked goods turn out crumbly.

All this trouble to prevent the butter from melting. Because otherwise you will get a completely different product.

Classic way

Ingredients

• 200 g butter;
• 300 g flour;
• a pinch of salt;
• 50–100 ml of water.

Preparation

Chop the cold butter into small cubes and place in the freezer for 15 minutes. At this time, sift the flour and salt and pour it onto the table or board. Place the butter cubes on top, sprinkle them generously with flour and use a knife or two to cut into the dough.

It is important to touch the oil with your hands as little as possible: body heat will quickly melt it, and the consistency will not be what you need.

When the butter and dough come together and turn into small grains, add water little by little, kneading the mass into a plastic ball. Place it in the freezer for 15 minutes. Then roll out the dough, put the filling, for example, and put it in the oven.

Lazy way

Technological progress does not stand still, why not use it in cooking. You will need the same ingredients and a food processor with blades. It is not necessary to chop the butter into small cubes: the device will handle it itself. Place butter and flour in a bowl and whisk. The main thing is not to overdo it; in the end you should get the same grains.

Gradually add ice water until the dough begins to come together into a ball. The following instructions are the same as in the classic recipe.

Shortbread dough can be stored in the freezer for several weeks.

Supplements

You can deviate from the basic recipe. Here are some ideas:

1. Place 50–100 g of sugar into the sweet pie dough.
2. Replace 30 g of flour with the same amount of cocoa - you will get chocolate dough.
3. Add up to half a glass of finely chopped nuts.
4. Flavor the mixture with citrus zest or vanilla.

This recipe will yield a more flexible dough that is easier to roll out. Baked goods made from it crumble less. By the way, in culinary disputes, some confectioners refuse to call chopped dough shortbread. They believe that only with the help of such a recipe can they obtain a classic base for tarts and baskets.

The oil should not be cold, but chilled. It is impossible to explain how one state differs from another. Just remove the product from the freezer an hour before cooking.

Ingredients

• 100 g butter;
• 100 g sugar (preferably powdered sugar);
• 250 g flour;
• 1 egg (or 2 yolks).

Preparation

It is better to mix the ingredients with a spatula or spoon, and use your hands only at the last stage, when you need to gather the dough into a ball. Cream butter and sugar, add flour, then egg.

If you have a food processor, delegate all these responsibilities to it.

You can chill the dough and then cut it. You can first give it the desired shape and then put it in the freezer. It is important that it goes into the oven cold.

3. Curd shortbread dough

This dough is less finicky to work with than its counterparts without cottage cheese, and has less calories, since the fermented milk product replaces half the butter.

Ingredients

• 100 g cottage cheese;
• 100 g butter;
• 180 g flour;
• ½ teaspoon of soda;
• ½ teaspoon salt.

Preparation

Rub the cottage cheese through a sieve, grate the cold butter. Mix both ingredients with a fork, add flour, soda and salt. Quickly knead the dough until smooth, put it in a bag and put it in the refrigerator for an hour.

What to do next

If there is a pie on the menu, roll out the dough to the size of the mold, pierce it several times with a fork to prevent it from swelling, cover with parchment paper and cover with a weight. Special heat-resistant balls or beans and peas can be used as a weighting agent. This design is baked for about 15 minutes at 180 °C. Then remove the weight, add the pie filling and cook until done.

It is better to choose the filling adjusted for the sugar content in the dough. Unsweetened chopped is suitable for quiches with filling, pies with meat and vegetables. Dough with added sugar will be the basis for fruit and berry

Baskets are baked in the same way, only the cooking time must be reduced in proportion to the reduction in the size of the cakes. It is enough to bake cookies and other small products in the oven until lightly browned, otherwise they will be too hard.

Many people love shortcrust pastry for its crumbliness, ease of preparation and speed of baking. And also for the large and varied selection of baked goods made from it. There are different types of shortcrust pastry and methods for kneading them.

Composition and mixing methods

Basic ingredients for 400 g of shortcrust pastry:

• wheat flour - 200 g
• granulated sugar - 100 g
• butter - 100 g
• egg yolk - 1 piece.

You can knead the dough in two ways.

First way: Mix cooled butter with dry ingredients and grind until crumbs form. Then knead quickly. Cool the resulting dough.

Second way: Grind the softened butter with sugar until the butter dissolves. Now you can add flour and eggs. After kneading the dough, put it in the refrigerator. After 30-40 minutes you can start molding the products.

You can replace some of the flour with starch. Then the amount of flour needs to be reduced. Change the taste and aroma of baked goods by adding chopped nuts, cocoa, and spices (cinnamon, vanilla, nutmeg) to the dough. Or maybe add orange and lemon zest? Show your culinary imagination using various toppings.

If you see a whole egg in the ingredients for shortcrust pastry, it is better to replace it with yolks. In this case, the shortbread dough becomes more crumbly and tender.

Types of shortcrust pastry

There are many different types of this test. The choice of one type or another depends on what kind of shortcrust pastry products we want to make. By adding additional ingredients to the main recipe, we get different types test.

The classic recipe for shortcrust pastry consists only of a mixture of flour, sugar and butter. A small amount may be added to the binder. cold water(it is better to use peeled).

By adding eggs to this mixture, we get egg shortbread dough.

Shortbread dough is considered yeast-free. But by adding yeast to the composition, we get yeast shortbread dough. The result is a kind of mix that has the characteristics of both types. This dough is soft and tender (like yeast dough), as well as crumbly and melting in the mouth (like the “shortbread” classic).

You can make lean shortbread dough if you add vegetable oil instead of butter. It turns out to be somewhat tougher, but is used in some types of baked goods for the effect of contrasting dough and juicy filling.

Using fermented milk products, mix sour cream shortbread dough and kefir dough. To prevent this dough from becoming hard, add baking powder or soda (quenching it with vinegar or lemon juice).

You will have a wonderful cheese shortcrust pastry when you add hard cheese. To do this, take cheese and flour in a 1:1 ratio. Before kneading the cheese dough, grate the hard cheese. In such a dough, a pinch of ground black pepper would not be superfluous.

Continuing the fermented milk theme, we suggest preparing shortbread dough with cottage cheese. This is a great choice if you have a fruit or berry filling. The light sourness of the curd dough and the sweet juiciness of the filling... An enchanting combination in the best traditions of French culinary specialists.

Potato shortbread dough is made by adding potatoes to the dough. To do this, it is first boiled and grated. Place in the dough in a 1:1 ratio with flour. Continue with the main recipe.

There is a special type of shortcrust pastry. This is Brize dough. It is prepared without adding sugar. There are also no eggs in Breeze. But despite this, it tastes very good. The consistency is dense (no baking powder is used in it) and resembles a puff pastry. This universal recipe comes from France, where it is very popular.

from unsweetened dough

Streusel is a confectionery crumb made from shortcrust pastry. To obtain it, mix the ingredients and grind them into a “sandy” mass. This creates a coarse streusel crumb. And if you need a fine streusel, grind the coarse crumbs through a sieve.

and almond streusel

In Germany, a pie of the same name is popular, in which part of the shortcrust pastry is laid out in a mold as a base. A layer of filling is laid on top of the base, which is sprinkled with “sand crumbs” on top, i.e. streusel.

Sand secrets

1. Before kneading shortbread dough, all products must be cooled. This is especially true for butter (it must be solid). If you add water, it should be ice cold.
2. You can use more than just a knife to chop butter. It is very convenient to grate hard butter on a coarse grater.
3. Try to knead the dough as quickly as possible. With prolonged contact of hands with the dough, the fat contained in it (butter, margarine) melts. This leads to stiffness of the finished products.
4. If you want a crispier and more crumbly dough, add powdered sugar instead of sugar. Also, for this purpose, only egg yolks are used instead of eggs.
5. After kneading the dough, put it in the refrigerator. It should stay there for at least half an hour (and preferably 40-45 minutes).
6. Wrap the dough in cling film before storing in the refrigerator. This will prevent the dough from absorbing foreign odors and will also prevent it from becoming airy.
7. Let the dough sit at room temperature before rolling out. It will acquire plasticity and roll out easier.
8. Roll out the shortbread dough to a thickness of approximately 4-8 mm. If the layer is thicker, it will not bake well.
9. The baking tray or baking pans do not need to be greased. The dough contains enough fat and it will not stick.
10. Before placing in the oven, prick the dough with a fork in several places. This will prevent bubbles from appearing on the surface.
11. Oven temperature and baking time depend on the thickness of the dough and the type of baked goods. So for baskets and tartlets, the thickness of the dough is 3-4 mm. They are baked for 10-12 minutes at 230-240 degrees. All kinds of stars, rings, etc. 6-7 cm thick. Bake for 12-15 minutes at a temperature of 220-240 degrees. Cakes for cakes and bases for pies are 7-9 cm thick. They are baked at 210-220 degrees for 15-20 minutes.
12. You can prepare the shortbread dough and store it in the refrigerator. The shelf life will be 7-10 days.

What to cook from shortcrust pastry

The number of types of shortcrust pastry baked goods is large and varied. You can use shortbread cookie dough. Make it in the form of various figures (stars, hearts, animals, etc.). Or cook it.

A cake or pie made from shortcrust pastry will decorate any table. For cakes, shortbread cakes are baked, which are then coated with cream. Using shortbread dough, you can make pies with sweet (fruits, berries) or savory fillings. Unsweetened filling can be fish, meat, vegetable, mushroom. Thus, you can make a closed or open pie. But more often open-faced pies (such as tart or quiche) are baked.

Some recipes:

Wonderful baskets and tartlets are also made from shortcrust pastry. Fill them with various fillings. For example, baskets - fresh fruits or berries with whipped cream. And tartlets - pate, red or black caviar. You can also fill them with a small amount of salad (meat, crab).

Now you have met various types shortcrust pastry and learned many secrets of its preparation. Using the knowledge gained, you will be able to properly knead any shortbread dough and prepare delicious homemade cakes from it.

No use of baking powder. It is used to prepare open fruit and snack pies with sweet/salty filling, cakes, cookies, and tartlets. The more powdered sugar and fat in the dough, the more crumbly it is. Thanks to this, the product seems to melt in your mouth. Baking made from shortcrust pastry is high (404 kcal per 100 g). Therefore, it is not suitable for people on a diet.

Advantages and disadvantages

The first advantage of shortcrust pastry is its rich vitamin and mineral composition. It contains: , , , biotin, cyanocobalamin, . True, due to the abundance of fats, this product is in no way suitable for a diet.

The second obvious advantage of shortcrust pastry is its speed of preparation. However, the steps must be followed technological process, you cannot combine all the ingredients at the same time, so as not to spoil the crumbly baked goods. They are laid sequentially.

The third advantage of the test is the ability to change taste qualities. It can be made nutty, chocolatey or flavored by introducing additional ingredients.

The fourth advantage of shortcrust pastry products is that, after intensive physical activity, help quickly fill the body with energy and restore vitality.

The harm of such baking lies in the high calorie content of the product. Fatty shortcrust pastry products lead to weight gain. In addition, if low-quality raw materials are used, you can suffer from chemical additives, preservatives, and dyes added to butter and margarine.

It is not recommended to consume products made from shortcrust pastry more than twice a week over 100 g/approach, otherwise the level of sugar in the body will gradually increase, which may cause the development cardiovascular diseases, diabetes mellitus.

Cooking secrets

Properly kneaded shortbread dough is soft and crumbly. A solid product indicates errors in the technological process.

Subtleties of preparation:

1. Temperature of ingredients. The liquid should be cold, the butter should be solid, but not frozen. It is preferable to keep the kitchen cool.
2. Butter and margarine. The final result depends on the quality of these products. They give the dough a crumbly effect, so you should not skimp on fats.
3. Consistency of bread crumbs. The flour is ground with fat. The resulting mass should have the consistency of bread crumbs. When stirred, butter (margarine) envelops the flour particles, and gluten, when combined with moisture, gives elasticity and firmness to the dough. As a result, it turns out soft and crumbly.
4. Proportions. In the process of preparing the dough, the amount of flour and fat is taken at the rate of 1.5: 1.
5. Manual kneading. Shortbread dough does not tolerate technical processing in a food processor. It is kneaded by hand, but not for long. You must not allow the butter to begin to melt, otherwise the product will not be soft and delicate in taste.
6. Sweetener. It is recommended to replace sugar with powdered sugar, this will improve the friability of the product.
7. Binding agent. An egg can add toughness to shortbread dough, so it is not recommended to add it. If you are preparing a large portion for the pie, you can use the yolk to bind all the ingredients.
8. Bookmark components. First of all, the flour is combined with sugar, vanillin and soda. Then pieces of fat are introduced and rubbed. Finally, a binding liquid is added. It could be yolks, or.
9. Correct rolling. Before processing and baking, the shortbread dough is pre-cooled for 30 minutes. It is rolled out from the center to the edges, lightly sprinkled with flour. The optimal thickness of the dough for baking is 4-8 mm.
10. Preheated oven. Shortbread dough products are baked at 180-200 degrees. Thin layers are at elevated temperatures, thick layers are at lower temperatures.

Do not grease the pan when baking. The dough already contains a sufficient amount, so it does not stick to the mold. If the product begins to burn on top, cover it with parchment paper.

Properly prepared dough is smooth and matte, but if it begins to shine, crumble, or roll out poorly, it means the butter has melted. In this case, it is left to “rest” in the refrigerator for 40-60 minutes. Before rolling out, sprinkle the board and dough with flour. Finished sand products have a light brown, golden hue.

Cooking principle

The basis of shortcrust pastry is flour and butter. The key to success depends on the quality of the ingredients, the degree of their cooling and temperature regime in room.

Remember, liquid seasonings are always mixed with egg yolk if the recipe calls for one, and dry spices, including grated nuts, are added to the flour.

Ingredients:

• butter – 100 g;
• water – 30 ml;
• flour – 200 g;
• sugar - to taste;
• , vanillin, zest - a pinch.

Cooking method:

1. Combine flour with lemon zest, salt and sugar.
2. Cool the butter, cut into cubes, add to the mixture.
3. Grind the dough base until it forms bread crumbs.
4. Pour in water, knead the dough smoothly, and form into a ball.
5. Wrap the resulting mass in cling film and place in the refrigerator for half an hour.
6. Roll out the layer, place on a baking sheet, bake at 200 degrees.

Use the finished cake (tartlet) as an edible form for salads, cream, and fruit fillings. If the product is stuck to the bottom of the baking sheet, you need to wait until it cools down, then lightly hit it on the table. Once the tartlet has moved, you can carefully remove it from the mold.

Convenience foods: pros and cons

Currently, ready-made shortbread dough can be found in the store. However, when buying a semi-finished product, you must carefully study the composition of the product. It must be free of leavening agents and preservatives, and the product’s expiration date must be current.

A non-crumbly, dense, hard semi-finished product indicates long-term kneading, a high content of liquid, sugar, gluten in flour, a small amount of fat and the use of proteins instead of yolks.

Non-plastic dough, crumbling, which cannot be rolled out indicates the use of melted butter in the process of kneading the dough, warm ingredients, as well as a violation of the temperature regime in the room.

A raw, poorly baked store-bought product indicates uneven rolling of the layer. As well as excessive baking temperature and insufficient heat treatment. At the same time, a pale semi-finished product, on the contrary, indicates a low temperature regime.

Why does shortbread dough shrink when rolled out?

It's all about non-compliance with the proportions of the ingredients. Most likely there was very little margarine or butter, and too much flour and liquid.

Baking pastries requires precision. All ingredients must be carefully weighed; their quantities cannot be changed at will, otherwise you should not be surprised that nothing happened.

Quiche recipe

Quiche is a French open pie invented by the inhabitants of the province of Lorraine in the 16th century. The basis for the filling is eggs, cheese, fatty acids. Currently, there are many variations of preparing quiche - with mushrooms, fish, smoked brisket, onions, berries and herbs. Consider a traditional recipe.

Classic quiche Lauren

Ingredients for the dough:

• chilled butter, grated on a coarse grater – 125 g;
• sifted flour – 250 g;
• chilled yolk – 2 pcs;
• ice water – 50 ml;
• salt - a pinch.

Filling ingredients:

• heavy cream 20% – 200 ml;
• smoked brisket – 250 g;
• grated – 150 g;
• eggs – 4 pcs;
• grated - a pinch;
• freshly ground, salt to taste.

Cooking principle

Knead the shortbread dough, shape it into a ball, wrap it in cling film, and place it in the refrigerator for 1 hour. Slice the brisket and fry it butter. Beat the eggs, measure out 2/3 of the cheese, mix with cream. Season the filling with nutmeg, salt and pepper. Add brisket to the egg-cream mixture.

Roll out the dough, make sides, pierce with a fork. Place the filling and sprinkle the remaining cheese on top. Preheat the oven to 190 degrees. Place the quiche in the oven and bake for 30-45 minutes until done. The liquid from the eggs should evaporate, the filling should thicken, the top should brown, and the surface should become elastic. Only after this the pie is taken out of the oven and cut into portions.

French quiche Lauren served with sour cream and herbs. It can be eaten both hot and cold at any time of the day.

Bon appetit!

Conclusion

Shortbread dough is the basis for making confectionery and snacks. Its main advantages are versatility and ease of preparation. The dough is quickly kneaded and does not require enormous labor costs. Shortbread cakes, tartlets, nuts, and baskets are widely used for filling with chocolate, berries, nuts, fruits, and salads. However, such baked goods contain a lot of fat, so they are not recommended for overweight people. Otherwise, it will stimulate the process of obesity.

In moderation confectionery based on shortbread dough do not pose any danger or benefit to human health.