Pastry for Tartes and Rissoles

All of our sources reference tarts or pies, and many rissoles, both of which require a dough or “paste” to form the exterior. Unfortunately, we have very little information on how that dough was formed. We know it needs to be bake-able, and we know it should be golden – achieved either through egg yolks or Saffron. The Pastry Cook is universally referred to as a different office, and sometimes a separate business altogether, and so our main sources neglect the details of the Pasty Cook’s art, I suspect largely from ignorance of it. While the flour used for bread is worth a project of its own, here we are lucky to be instructed to use the best white flour, and so we will. Rice flour can also be substituted, though the dough should rest overnight if so.

Nonetheless, Forme of Cury gives us the simple direction to “Take the best white flour, and make a paste with water” in the recipe for “Loysyns.” (XX.II.IX) Likewise, it tells us “make your pastry dough with egg yolks without any water; and form your pastry case” in one recipe and “take white sugar, eggs, and flour and make a paste with a roller” in another (C. XIII) so it seems a fair assumption that pastry was made, at least, from some combination of flour, whole eggs or egg yolks, and/or water. I reject, therefore, the common use of “hot water pastry” which seems to appear on record after 1600 even if it is a convenient vehicle for tart casings. The recipe below combines whole eggs and egg yolks in a ratio I find gives us the best qualities for general use.