Sourdough Puff Pastry made With Discard Starter
This sourdough puff pastry is made with discard sourdough starter, rolled with butter to make the lightest, flakiest layers. The sourdough starter adds a tang, and I also give the pastry and overnight ferment to make it better for digestibility and easier to roll out.
Discard starter pastry
There’s no need to feed your sourdough starter for this pastry, an unfed or discard starter is best. The pastry relies on bacteria in the starter to ferment the flour, not the yeast component of a starter. It’s the water that evaporates from the butter that gives puff pastry its rise.
Usually, puff pastry needs hours resting between each couple of turns to rest the gluten. This sourdough puff pastry requires a shorter amount of refrigerated resting during the folds, only really to keep the butter chilled.
The components of puff pastry
Puff pastry has two main parts – the détrempe which is the dough (in this case, a sourdough dough) and the butter block (the beurrage.) The puff pastry is rolled out and folded multiple times to create the layers, and the ‘puff’. The fermented sourdough base dough is so pliable and doesn’t resist rolling the way that regular dough often can if it’s not allowed to rest.
Method
- The first step is to make the détrempe which is really easy to hand knead into a smooth and slightly tacky dough. I place this in the fridge for 8-20 hours to ferment, but you can cut this down to 1-2 hours if you like.
- Place butter between two sheets of parchment. Use a rolling pin to pound and shape it into a neat 6″ square. Chill until cold but still pliable.
- Once the dough has chilled, roll it into a 9″ rectangle.
- Place chilled, pliable butter in the center
- Fold the dough over the butter from all sides, sealing the edges so the butter is fully wrapped.
- Gently roll into a long rectangle.
- Focus on keeping an even thickness.
- Fold the top third down.
- Fold the bottom third up. This was a single turn.
- Rotate the dough 90°, roll again into a rectangle, fold again into thirds. This completes 2 turn.
- Wrap the dough and chill for 20–30 minutes to keep butter cold and relax the gluten. Continue with 4 more turns, so there are 6 in total, chilling between every 2 turns.
- Chill the dough for a minimum of 2 hours in the refrigerator after the final turn.
Cooking temperature and time
The cooking temperature and time will depend on the recipe you use the puff pastry in. Puff pastry does best in an initially hot oven of around 200°C/400°F to allow the pastry to puff up nice and big. The time needed for this depends on how the puff pastry is being used. A good puff pastry will quadruple in height, and butter leakage should not be an issue. If you find your pastry is leaking, or it’s not rising well it is probably the butter that hasn’t been incorporated evenly.
Storing
Unbaked puff pastry can be frozen for up to 4 months to use at a later date. If you’re freezing it, let it thaw in the refrigerator or at room temperature before rolling it out. Don’t let the dough warm up so the butter doesn’t melt and the dough becomes too floppy to use. This recipe makes around 600g. It can be easily doubled if you’d like to make extra pastry for future uses.
Puff pastry recipes
Two of my favorite ways to use puff pastry are by making flaky Elephant Ear Cookies (Palmiers) or apple hand pies! Or, see below for more sourdough discard recipes.
Sourdough Puff Pastry
Ingredients
- 225 g all-purpose flour
- 60 g sourdough discard starter
- 100 g cold water
- 1/2 tsp salt 1/4 teaspoon if using salted butter
- 30 g butter
Butter packet
- 200 g butter
Instructions
Day 1
- In a bowl, add the flour, sourdough starter, water, and salt and knead it into a shaggy dough. Bring it onto a clean work surface and knead it to bring into a dough ball. Work in 30g butter and knead for 4-5 minutes into a smooth ball then place it in an airtight container in the refrigerator for 8-20 hours. 225 g all-purpose flour, 60 g sourdough discard starter, 100 g cold water, 1/2 tsp salt, 30 g butter
Day 2
- Take two sheets of parchment paper. Fold or crease the parchment into a 15cm/6inch “packet”. Lay the slices of butter on one sheet of parchment and place the second sheet on top. Using a rolling pin, pound the butter out into the square, push and nudge the butter into the corners so it fills the packet evenly. 200 g butter
- Place the butter rectangle in the refrigerator for around 10 minutes to firm up slightly, but ensure it’s still a little pliable and not rock hard. If you're making the butter block in advance, take it out 15 minutes before you laminate the dough, to slightly soften. You want the butter and dough to be similar consistency.
Laminating
- Take the dough from the refrigerator and roll it out in front of you into a 23cm (9") square. Take the cool butter and set it in the center of the dough at a 45° angle, so it looks like a diamond inside the larger dough square.
- Fold the four corners of the dough over the butter, meeting in the middle.Pinch or press the seams together so the butter is fully enclosed, no gaps.
- Gently push with a rolling pin a few times along the length of the dough to help work in the butter. Roll the pastry out into a rectangle and fold it into thirds, like a pamphlet. That was a single turn.
- Rotate the dough 90°, roll again into a rectangle, fold again into thirds. This completes 2 turn. Wrap the dough and chill for 20–30 minutes to keep butter cold and relax the gluten. Continue with 4 more turns, so there are 6 in total, chilling between every 2 turns.
- After all the turns are completed, let the dough chill for a minimum of 2 hours in the refrigerator before rolling it for baking.
Baking Temperature and Time
- The baking temperature and time will depend on the recipe you use the puff pastry in. Puff pastry does best in a hot oven of around 200°C/400°F to allow the pastry to puff up nice and big.
I know you said that a starter fed within the last 10 hours is good to use. Should it pass a float test? Or is it ok to use a starter which was just fed an hour before hand?
1 hour is too early as that will still include a lot of unfermented flour. You can use the float test to test it 😊
If we are doubling the recipe, do we need to roll the butter and dough to twice the dimensions specified? So each time it would be 40 x 60 cm?
I just doubled the recipe and I doubled the dimensions as well when I was rolling it out. Make sure your butter isn’t too soft or it’ll be difficult to roll out, trust me on that one haha. Other than that, it seems to be the same as if you did a smaller batch. I’m hoping this recipe is forgiving on how much rolling and handling is applied to it :).
I doubled it and kept the dimensions the same with no problems! Theres no need to make it twice as long
Hi! How thick should I roll it out before I cook it? And at what temp/how long should I cook it? I’m planning to use it ontop of a Irish pot pie. Thanks so much!!
Heya, you can treat as you would store bought puff pastry sheets and roll it as thin as they would be, about 4-5mm and bake it at a higher temperature for 10 minutes to get that initial oven spring (around 220 Celsius), then lower the temp to continue baking until crispy 😊
Depends what your doing with it? I roll mine thicker for pastries and thinner for wellington so whatever your recipe says
Hey 🙂
Your recipes all look great, can’t wait to give one a try this weekend!
I’m fairly new to baking, especially sourdough. I was wondering what the difference is between the puff pastry recipe and the pastry used in the croissant recipe? Is it the same base they are just different end products?
Thanks!
Bethan
Hey, so the croissant dough is a bit different. It rises using both yeast from the starter and from the butter in the layers, so it needs an active and fed starter. Whilst the puff pastry gets its rise purely from the water in the butter evaporating, which is why it gets rolled 3 more times than croissants, to create more layers and more rise. And that’s also why a puff pastry can be made using older or discard starter, it doesn’t need the yeast😊
Hi. Thank you for the detailed recipe an pictorial folding technique. You mentioned this can be made with discard starter. So i am assuming levain past its peak is fine to go too, right?
Yup 😊
Can this dough be frozen and used for baking later?
Yup it can 🙂 there are notes about it in the post
Do you use 100% hydration starter?
Yup 🙂
First time attempting sourdough puff pastry and it worked amazingly! I’ve just used the pastry to make veggie sausage rolls and they are simply delicious.
Thank you for the recipe
i understood the starter to be a discard rather than 100% hydration??
Hey Nancy it is still discard starter but my starter is always 100% hydration as well since it’s fed equal weights water and flour
is there a video to watch?
Not yet for this post unfortunately!
Im really interested to make it with you recipe , but I am totally new to puff pastry, wish I could watch a video from you to follow .
If you double the recipe, can you just roll it double the size, or must you do it twice? Thank you!
You can double the recipe and just roll it a bit bigger 🙂
I’m excited to try this, thanks for explaining your recipe and process so thoroughly. For this recipe, do the shaped pastries need to proof before baking?
Hey, nope they don’t! All the rising for this pastry comes from the butter 🙂
Omg this is the best puff pastry recipe. I will never use store bought again. It was so light airy, flaky delicate but can hold toppings. My friends could not stop eating it. Truly amazing thanks so much for sharing! I will always have some in my freezer. I used it after thawing in the refrigerator it couldn’t have been better.
So happy you loved it!! Thank you!
How do you convert the amounts to cups and teaspoons or tablespoons? I’ve all but given up trying to figure this out. Thank you!!!
Hey Deb, for American cups it’s around 1 3/4 cup + 1/2 tablespoon flour, 1/4 cup sourdough discard, 1/3-1/2 cup water, 1 cup butter.
Thank you SO much – this pastry is delicious! I used it to make sausage rolls topped with sesame seeds for Christmas, and they looked and tasted amazing 🙂 My family loved them 🙂 The pastry was buttery, light, gorgeous with a very slight tang. A million times better than store bought. I think I’ll be making these every year now!
So happy to hear you loved it!! 😃 thank you!
Nice way of using a discard starter, thanks for pointing this out! Will definitely try it over the weekend (and let you know how this compares to a classic “pâte feuilletée”).
One note: I had never heard of the English “detemper”. In French, we say “détrempe” (for flour which needs to absorb water, and is usually cooled down). Funny to see how the “r” shifted from the ‘t’ to the end of the word.
Ohh I’ve been spelling it wrong the entire time! Thank you for pointing that out! I hope you enjoy the recipe 😀
Actually I think you were doing it right! The English seems to be “distemper” so indeed with the inversion on the “r”.
Feeding my surdough just now… so let’s see 😉
thanks again for all the beautiful and inspiring recipes.
This is an amazing recipe. I make it at least twice a month and I agree, the discard makes it an absolute pleasure to handle. I had to start searching for creative ideas/recipes to use all the puff I make! Haha!
I tried both the puff pastry and croissant discard recipes and both were wonderful!! No problems whatsoever! Highly recommend!
Hi there I was so excited to try out this recipe. I still have one more roll and turn to go but it has been a huge butter mess for me. I’m not sure what happened lol I followed everything exactly I did two Separate doughs and one is a little better but the butter is just coming out from everywhere. I’m just worried I won’t be able to use it.
Hey, it might be too warm if the butter is squishing out! Chill it until it firms up before rolling
Can you refrigerate the dough for mor than 2 hours before using it?
Yup up to 36 hours if wrapped tightly, or freeze it 🙂
You didn’t say but did you use a mixer to get the dough to ball? Mixer speed? Thank you
As you can tell I’m new to this.
Hey Debbie, I knead this by hand. If you want to use a mixer, I would use medium speed 🙂
It’s perfect, 10/10. At first I was worried it would have that tangy sourdough taste to it….but honestly its better than Pillsbury or any store bought puff pastry. I made these and stuffed them with all types of things, baked at 400 for 20 minutes and they were PERFECT! Super flaky, puffy and thick and SOFT…..Even on my first try this recipe was so easy to follow and was a HUGE hit for new years…..THANK YOU!!
Thank you so much for your lovely feedback!! 😀
Hello,
Can I use active starter, or strictly only discard?
Hey Jade, if you do want to use active starter, that is fine too. 🙂
I wondered if I could this dough for apple turnovers. My family is pretty sure you can’t use discard to make puff pastry and they still taste like original puff. I really want to try this recipe cause I made your croissants and they were divine. Just wondered how the texture is?
Hey Marie, you can use this for turnovers yup! The discard brings an acidic component to the dough that makes it slightly more tender. It’s not there for any flavour or rising or anything so it will still taste like regular puff 🙂