13 Days Stinct Asian Pastries Workshop @ BITC Prima

My baking interest inclined more towards western pastries in the inital years. With the influx of thousands free recipes in the Web and the generosity of many Asian food bloggers, I got to read so much more of the wide spectrum of asian pastries and amazed by the diversity. However, without the basic understanding of the fundamental techniques, many of my trials adapted from recipes in the web proved disastrous. The celebration of Singapore 50th Year Independance showered many attractive purchases discount to the Singaporeans and it was this privilege that helped me to save 50% off the course fee at BITC.

Day One: First day at school excitement crawled up to me early morning while ironing the college uniform and picturing myself in the thick white cotton jacket and checkered pants. The 75 mins bus ride to Vivocity from home was a nerve wrecker. A big breakfast I gave myself at end of ride brought some morning cheers. Much to my delight upon arrival at the classroom to see only three other students participating. A whiner from birth survives better in small group learning.

Lao Po Bing

Lesson one was the introduction of the famous huaiyang chinese water / oil dough pastry. Basically, the water dough is a lean dough with 35% of fat to flour and the oil dough of 50% fat. Both the doughs are rolled into small balls. The lamination of the two different doughs create the layers of flakes, visible after baking. The different fats proportion and ways of lamination give rise to many kinds of delicious pastries.

Using the swiss roll lamination, we baked the Lao Po Bing and Century Egg Puff , which supposingly to be the most basic technique of all the others. I also get to learn my mistake of wrapping the two doughs too tightly hence , giving no space for expansion of the flakes. We were also instructed to use cake flour for the oil dough and not using the same plain flour as the water dough. The century egg puff lacked some ginger juice - necessary to balance the sweet lotus paste. The chef turned a deaf ear to my feedback but I be sure the other fellow students hear me out.

Century Egg Puff

Day Two: Using the previous day flaky pastry recipe, we were taught to create the lovely Chrysanthemum Crisp and the beloved Char Siew Soh using the 4-folds lamination.

The twisting of the slited dough to form the flower petals is a sure test of our patience and how well the eyeballs synchronise with the fingers. Indeed a delicate piece of pastry sensational to the eyes and taste buds.

The flexibiltiy of the huaiyang pastry is incredible; with the same dough we create char siew soh. Through another method of wrapping filling, came to birth this majestic, awe-inspiring dim sum delight.

Being a halal certified kitchen, the char siew meat filling was substituted by chicken instead and so the flavour wasn't as tasty as original ones. The pastry flakiness was indeed remarkable. The lovely golden glaze was two coats of beaten egg yolk. A bite of it...a load of guilt !!

Day 3: These flaky egg tarts are most flavourful of all, notably of its highest fat percentage in comparision to other "chinese piahs / pin". Using the water/ oil dough method but with a 100% fat for the oil dough. The oil dough has the texture of creamed butter and the mixture is poured into a plastic and shaped into a square block. The block of fat is then placed in the freezer till firm.

4 x 4 x 4 fold

Here, a mass lamination is adopted and the combined dough is folded three times using the puff pastry technique. The dough is chilled after each fold and the chef strongly recommended the 4 x 4 x 4 ie bringing the both ends to the center followed by a half fold. The filling is a mixture of lightly beaten eggs , syrup and milk. The tarts are baked till crust are light golden brown and a little wobbly in center.

Day 4: This day, the focus shifted to pastries that have to be deep-fried. The glutinous rice dough can be stuffed with a lotus paste (jin dui ) or savoury meat filling (hum sui kok) The frying process requires full attention to the fire temperature, and stirring all the time to prevent the balls from sticking to each other.

Jin Dui

Day 5: Deep-fried pastries continued...Flaky Yam Mooncakes are so adored by many during the Autumn Festival. This recipe we used a 25% and 45% fat portion and adopted a two and half turns folding method to create the flakes. The oil temperature and quantity have to be carefully monitored to prevent oozing of the yam filling.

Flaky Yam Mooncakes

Day 6: We continued another day of arduous hours in the kitchen, to be fascinated by the technique of preparing batter dough. Some rest of the batter between stirs are so essential to derive a smoothness of the finished product. One very example is the making of chee cheong fun whereby every chefs safe-lock their little secret. An exhilarating fun in playing with the monstrous steamer in picture.

chee cheong fun

Thick batter dough was introduced to us after the morning break. With the yam cake recipe, we could go on to make the steam radish or pumpkin cakes effortlessly.

Yam cake

Day 7: The learning of pouring hot water to wheat starch that gives a easily malleable dough , I simply adore ! Pleating these small round stretchy delicate dough with the chunky prawns in center was a test of fingers coordination, deciding which finger to move forwards and when to pinch a beautiful pleat. These ones in picture are far from perfection and I have written on my KIV list to make them more sumptuous looking and translucent. By the way ,we also made siew mai but they were too disastrous to be on the page.

Day 8: Exhaustion is starting to creep up on me, but with a new dough to learn each day, my enthusiasm serves as the main motivating force to kick myself up from bed and travel on an hour public transport to the school. Supple and cottony longevity baos (shou tao) was highlight of the day. Using an hour sourdough to blend with the final mix gave a superb fine texture and in addition with a generous stuffing of lotus paste in the dough makes it a heart- warming birthday gift for an elderly. These mantou of fancy designs were also made from the same bao dough.

Day 9: The vigorous whisking of eggs before folding of flour was a good lesson for me as my sponge cakes in the past lack batter stability. The egg batter taught to us must reached the stage of soft peaks of meringue, not ribbon-like flow.

steam cakes with salt yolk

Day 10: The process of deep frying a starch-based dough is intriguing. With a small amount of wheat starch and shortening to the dough gives a lattice-net design when a right oil temperature is maintained in the process. The whole class failed miserably in their efforts to achieve the lattice design at the class kitchen. I brought home the uncooked ones and deep fried them the next day , and they turned wonderfully well (see pictures). This led me to conclude that the oil temperature is the primary factor of success.