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Katerina's Kouzina

My Greek twist to Mille - Feuille

Today’s dessert recipe is my Greek version of the mille-feuille! The origin of this dessert is actually a bit of a mystery. Some say it was invented in France, while others claim it came from Naples, Italy. I wonder what my French and Italian friends have to say about it.

I actually don’t dare to call this recipe mille-feuille, instead I prefer the name ‘Layers of Delight’. Let me tell you why…

A thousand layers

I thought the word mille-feuille meant very hard work, working for a long time or having a backache. You see, when I made mille-feuille at school it would take so much time and effort. Traditionally the puff pastry is made by hand, using pounds of butter and lots of arm strength to continuously fold and re-fold the dough to create the many layers.

The reality is that ‘mille-feuille’ translates to ‘a thousand leaves’. It refers to the 1000 layers of the puff pastry, or the 1000 times you have to fold the pasty to get enough air in it to form the 1000 layers!!

Cheating on the dough

Nowadays I don’t have time to make this perfect dough, so I cheat by getting good quality frozen puff pastry. The only part of this recipe that takes effort is making the pastry cream (crème pâtissière), to ensure it comes out smooth and velvety. Other than that, making my Greek mille-feuille is very simple. This is the reason that I cannot call it by its real name!

Because mille-feuille is hard to cut through, I cut the puff pastry into individual portions and then assemble it, in that way you can serve it right up. I make them small so that I can eat more. Clever or not?

Making my Greek Mille-Feuille

The recipe for mille-feuille starts by making the tasty crème pâtissière! Does is not look delicious?


Don’t forget to pierce the puff pastry entirely before baking, to keep it from puffing like mad!


The pastry looks wonderful coming out of the oven!


Add a generous amount of crème pâtissière to the pastry and a piece of pastry on top of that.


Dust with icing sugar and you are ready to serve your Greek style mille-feuille!

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Ingredients

Zest from 1 orange
700 ml milk
200 ml cream
160 gr. sugar
5 egg yolks
½ tsp vanilla extract
80 gr. cornstarch
100 gr. butter
200 gr. heavy cream
500 gr. puff pastry frozen

Instructions

1. We start by making the crème pâtissière. Pour the milk and cream into a large and heavy saucepan, and bring it to a boil over medium heat.
2. In a medium bowl, whisk together the cornstarch, the sugar, the zest, the vanilla and the eggs.
3. When the milk and cream almost come to a boil, gradually add 1/3 of it to the egg mixture, stirring constantly with a wooden spoon. Empty the ingredients of the bowl back to the saucepan and cook stirring constantly until the mixture thickens and comes to a full boil. Mix the butter in at that point, by whisking vigorously. Remove the pan from the heat, and set it aside. Refrigerate for 2-3 hours to chill completely.
4. Preheat oven to 190* C.
5. Lay out a sheet of puff pastry on a clean working surface.
6. Dust the pastry with icing sugar so that it can caramelize while baking and this way it will not soak up any moisture from the cream and become soggy. It will stay nice and crunchy.
7. Use a rolling pin and gently roll it over the pastry so the sugar can sink into the pastry. Pierce it all over with a fork.
8. Each sheet of pastry should yield 12 pieces.
9. Line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper.
10. Place the pieces of pastry on the baking sheets and prick it with a fork.
11. Dust with some icing sugar and bake for 15-20 minutes. When ready, remove from oven and set aside to cool.
12. Beat the chilled heavy cream in a mixer until it becomes thick and fluffy, like a thick yogurt.
13. When your crème pâtissière has chilled, beat it in a mixer for about 20 seconds, just to make it fluffy.
14. Combine the whipped cream with the crème pâtissière using a spatula to gently fold, until they are completely incorporated.
15. Divide the filling into 2 pastry bags.
16. Place 6 pieces of puff pastry on a plate and pipe out a generous amount of filling over them. Put on each of them another pastry on top. Repeat the same process until you have used all pastry and crème pâtissière.
17. Dust with icing sugar and serve!

Servings : 6-12 people
Ready in : 220 Minutes
Recipe Type : Desserts

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