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Each hostess can boast that she has her own culinary secrets and her signature “snacks” with which she pampers her family and guests for the holidays. However, in the past few years, many have “adopted” a rather easy-to-prepare and very effective French appetizer – flounces.
Vol-au-vents are weightless, very light tartlets. They are made from puff pastry. In the oven, it rises, as a result of which baskets are formed in the form of turrets or cups. Special craftsmen make flounces in the form of octahedrons or hexagons.
Such tartlets are stuffed with everything that is at hand – salads, cold cuts of meat, savory vegetable snacks, seafood, pies, sweet cream. Fruit desserts and jellies are also served in vol-au-vents.
Most often, French tartlets are tiny in diameter, literally “one bite”. However, flounces are also quite large, up to twenty centimeters in diameter. They are stuffed with fish, julienne or meat, then sent back to the oven and baked. They are served as a hot appetizer with spicy sauce. It is noteworthy that such vol-au-vents usually have “lids” made of dough.
Historical information
From French, vol-au-vent is translated as “flying in the wind.” It is believed that the “author” of puff tartlets is a native of the homeland of the three musketeers, chef Marie-Antoine Karem. He served at the court of the British monarch George IV and the Russian autocrat Alexander I, moreover, he managed to win wide recognition and popularity thanks to his talents and numerous improvisations.
As the legend goes, one day Karem promised to surprise his cooks. He put an absolutely flat circle of puff pastry on a baking sheet, which literally turned into a tall barrel before the eyes of the stunned spectators. “He takes off!” exclaimed the shocked cooks. This is how the name “volovan” appeared.
Dough for vol-au-vents
As noted above, flounces are made from puff pastry. Of course, you can buy it in the store, but many housewives prefer to cook the dough on their own to be sure of its quality.
For the preparation of French tartlets, both yeast and yeast-free puff pastry are suitable.
Yeast dough for vol-au-vents – recipe
To prepare yeast puff text, you will need good butter (100-300 g), yeast (20 g), one glass of milk (can be replaced with water), one egg, 20 g sugar, 3 g salt.
Pour the warmed milk into the prepared container. In another bowl, dissolve the yeast in a small amount of milk. Pour the diluted yeast into the main container, beat in the egg. Salt. Stir until the mixture is completely homogeneous. Slowly adding flour, start kneading the dough.
At the end of the batch, add pre-melted butter. Knead the dough as thoroughly as possible until the mixture is completely homogeneous. Cover the finished dough with a towel, then leave to rest for three hours.
After the dough has risen properly, roll it into a rectangular cake, the thickness of which should be from one to one and a half centimeters. Put half of the entire norm of butter in the center. Fold the crust in half. Put the remaining butter on it, then fold it in half again. Dust the dough folded in quarters with flour and roll it out again into a cake. Fold in quarters again, sprinkle with flour and roll out. Repeat the procedure at least eight times. The dough is ready.
Yeast-free puff pastry for vol-au-vents – recipe
For those who do not like to mess with yeast, there is another version of puff pastry – yeast-free. It can be used for croissants, puffs and vol-au-vents, and the preparation procedure will be less laborious.
You will need wheat flour (two cups), half a glass of water, half a teaspoon of salt, a teaspoon of freshly squeezed lemon juice, and 200 g of butter, which must first be strongly cooled.
Pour salt into half a glass of water. Stir until completely dissolved. Pour in the lemon juice.
Carefully sift the flour so that it is properly saturated with oxygen – this will help your dough become more airy. Shape the flour into a hill and make a well in the center.
Start gradually pouring water into the hole, mixing it with flour. This is how you will knead the dough. Pay attention to the texture – the dough should not be too sticky.
Prepare butter. It should be divided into six equal parts. Roll out the dough into a thin layer. Quickly grate one part of the butter on a grater and spread over the cake. Fold the dough in quarters and roll out again. Take the second part of the oil and repeat the procedure. Repeat manipulations until you use all the oil.
The finished dough should be properly cooled. Put it in the refrigerator for an hour and a half, after which you can start baking.
Preparation of vol-au-vents
To prepare vol-au-vents, you will need either special molds or two glasses with different diameters. You can, for example, use a glass and a regular glass.
Sprinkle the table with flour. After that, roll out about a third of the total mass of the dough. Using a large glass, cut out circles. Transfer them to a baking sheet, making sure to line it with baking paper first.
Slightly roll out the remaining dough. Cut out the same large circles, and then, using a glass, cut out a smaller circle from them. As a result, you will get rings. It is they who will become the walls of the vol-au-vents. The smallest circles will be caps.
Lay out future baking on a baking sheet so that there are at least two centimeters between the flounces – puff pastry grows well, increasing in diameter. When baking vol-au-vents, preheat the oven well – otherwise the dough will not rise.
Divide the egg by separating the white from the yolk. Slightly whisk the protein. Using a brush, lubricate the bottom circles and lids with protein. Poke holes in them with a toothpick to keep them from puffing up in the oven. Place rings-sides on top of the bottoms. They do not need to be lubricated with protein, otherwise the rings will not rise.
Place a baking sheet with blanks for vol-au-vents in the oven, preheating it to 220 degrees. Leave them in the oven for ten minutes until the sides rise. After the pastries have taken the desired shape, grease them with the remaining protein so that they are covered with a crispy crust. If you want the vol-au-vents to have a bright golden color, grease them with yolk.
Before removing the tartlets from the oven, make sure they are ready. Otherwise, the “barrels” will simply fall off.
Now the pastries should cool down properly – only after that the baskets can be stuffed.
Filling for vol-au-vents – general recommendations
As noted above, almost anything can be used for stuffing vol-au-vents. However, there are a number of general recommendations that should be followed so that baking retains an aesthetic appearance and excellent taste.
First of all, you need to put the filling only in the finished baking. Raw flounces are not stuffed. Even if French tartlets are used as a second course, ready-made volutes are cooled, stuffed, and then baked in the oven again.
For the filling, do not use ingredients that are too liquid, as well as products that release juice a lot. For example, tomatoes in any form are not a suitable filling for vol-au-vents. If you still want to please your guests with something juicy, put empty flounces on the table and serve the fillings separately so that the guests fill their tartlets themselves.
If the hot filling of the vol-au-vents is still too juicy, a few minutes before the end of baking, pour a little grated hard cheese inside each tartlet. It will melt, and after cooling, it will seize with a crust that will not allow the dough to become sour.
As noted above, fillings for vol-au-vents can be varied – you can experiment endlessly. However, the most popular are French tartlets with salty fillings, such as red caviar, as well as chicken and mushrooms.
Volovany with red caviar
Red caviar in elegant puff turrets looks just wonderful. Vol-au-vents with caviar are not only very tasty, but also incredibly beautiful. They will decorate any holiday table and will be a reason for enthusiastic compliments.
You will need half a kilo of dough, 20 g of butter and one can of caviar. Lubricate the finished and well-cooled flounces with a little butter and spread the caviar over the tartlets. This appetizer is best served when it is at room temperature.
Vol-au-vents with chicken and spinach
To prepare such an appetizer, the diameter of the vol-au-vents should be about ten centimeters. For half a kilo of puff pastry, you will need 250 g of fresh chicken breast, two rings of canned pineapple, a handful of spinach, 100 g of cherry tomatoes, two tablespoons of tomato sauce, the same amount of soy sauce, one tablespoon of olive oil, salt and sugar to taste.
Cut the pineapple into small cubes. Cut the cherry into four pieces. Wash the fillet, dry it, cut into small pieces and fry until a soft golden brown. Salt. Be careful not to dry out the meat. Add pineapple, cherry tomatoes, tomato and soy sauces and olive oil to the finished chicken. Put spinach greens at the bottom of the vol-au-vents, and place the rest of the ingredients on top.
Vol-au-venti with chicken and cream sauce
For twelve vol-au-vents with a bottom about ten centimeters in diameter, you will need 350 g of chicken fillet, 2 tablespoons of sour cream and the same amount of vegetable oil, half a teaspoon of turmeric. Add salt and pepper to taste.
Wash the fillet and cut into small pieces, which should be fried in a small amount of oil until golden brown. Add the rest of the ingredients and simmer for five minutes. After that, when the filling reaches room temperature, fill the flounces.
Vol-au-vents with mushrooms
For half a kilogram of dough for vol-au-vents, you will need 300 g of fresh champignons, half an onion, 60 g of any hard cheese, two tablespoons of vegetable oil. Salt to taste.
Rinse mushrooms thoroughly and finely chop. Clean and chop the onion. Pass it for three minutes in a small amount of sunflower oil in a pan, then add the mushrooms and fry until cooked.
Grate the cheese on a fine grater. Put the finished and cooled stuffing into flounces, sprinkle with cheese on top. Place the pastry in the preheated oven and wait for the cheese to melt. These flounces are served hot.