Chicken & Potato Curry Puff

The third and final recipe I attempted over the past long weekend was Chicken & Potato Curry Puff, from scratch. That's right, both the rough puff pastry and chicken & potato curry!

It has been like almost two years, since I attended Chef Christopher's Retro High Tea workshop which taught rough puff pastry, potato curry puff and chicken pie. From the workshop, I knew that making the rough puff pastry wouldn't be easy; my kitchen/house is rather warm and humid and the dough (main ingredients flour, butter and water) most likely difficult to handle. So put this recipe at the back of my mind, till recently where I gained some confidence handling dough (with the bread and tart making). Well, I could buy frozen puff pastry from supermarkets but never try never know.

Good thing it was attempted during weekend as I could take my own sweet time instead of being flustered and frustrated due to limited time. As far as possible, I would love to finish my bakes by afternoon to catch some sunlight for photo-taking. Alas, a lot of times I ended up finishing in the evening, and had to wait till next day for photography. Well, then again, my photography skills are that great to begin with lah, as compared to bloggers whose photos look good enough to eat! I aspire to be like them one of these days :p

Ok, back to the rough puff pastry (will not post recipe here due to copyright). I prepared the dough on Sunday night so that it could be sufficiently chilled. To make sure the dough is not too difficult to manage, I chilled the flour and butter beforehand before mixing/pressing them together into a rough crumbly ball. The surface that I use (only available space is my dining table which is glass top) to roll and fold the pastry has to be well floured I realised, otherwise the pastry will stick to the surface. Same goes for my wooden rolling pin (probably a stainless steel one would be better). Butter melts really really quickly!!! Basically I have to roll and fold the pastry a few times, chill in fridge for 20 mins, take out roll and fold again for like at least 3 times. After that, I chilled the pastry overnight.


The next day, prepare the chicken and potato curry. Basically fry all the ingredients (chicken, potato cubes, onion, curry powder and leaves, garlic, ginger, lemon grass) and let cool to room temperature.

Then it's where all the 'fun' began. To prevent pastry from melting too quickly, I worked with very small piece at a time (enough to cut just 2 to 3 pieces). Once again, surface well floured to prevent sticking. Gotta work fast as the longer each piece of pastry was handled, the more tacky it became. It was also not easy to fold/seal the pastry after adding the filling which included a small slice of hardboil egg (I think I was too generous :p). Most of my puffs turned out really ugly looking with odd shapes and some actually opened during baking.

15 mins of baking and viola, my first chicken & potato curry puff. The egg wash gave the puffs a very glossy touch which I thought looked good. These are the better lookers :p

The puffs were crispy on the outside and moist on the inside with generous filling. Hey, not bad at all! Hubby likes!

The next morning, the puffs looked almost the same but turned soft :( Even after zapping in microwave, they were no longer crispy (probably got to heat up using oven instead of microwave? I didn't try though).

That said, they were still quite well-received by colleagues who tried them =D and I'm definitely pleased with my first attempt.

With this rough puff pastry, I can proceed to make chicken pie, sardine puff... maybe next time I'll on the air-con in the living room when rolling/folding the pastry. Well, the next long weekend, perhaps.