In my forth week of purgatory, I’m starting to see one glaring trend.

All the ingredients are the same.  It’s like twins having twins.

At first glance this fact is disheartening, merely because the options for what you can do seem comparably thin.

But are they really?

How the hell do you get so many different products out of the same ingredients??

I mean it’s a strange fucked-up exercise in efficiency if you think about it.

And I know the secret.

Butter.

Butter is the whip master, and all the other ingredients are it’s little loving devoted slaves.

Let us consider:  except for a pinch of sugar, pie dough and puff pastry are comprised of exactly the same ingredients.

Pate Sucree (tart dough) is the same recipe as the classic sugar cookies you’d get at the store, the ones decorated with frosting.

I actually succeeded in making “biscuit sugar cookies” out of some extra tart dough I had because I’d cut in the butter pieces too large.  They tasted just like sugar cookies, and flaked just like biscuits.

It was a total accident but cool to be honest, because it illustrated to me that it really was all about what you do to the fat that changes the outcome of all these recipes we’ve been working with.

I now pass this on to you because it gives you an immeasurable amount of control in the kitchen.  Imagine your doughs/biscuits/pies turning out perfect every time.  It’s not luck, its how hot/cold/big/small those little fatty balls of inspiration are left in your dough.

You may now commence sitting atop your tower ruling the world.  I have the Night on Bald Mountain image flashing through my head right now, with the big winged red-eyed dude like, wreaking havoc.

BUTTER!  YOU ARE MINE!  I SHALL NOW WIELD YOU!!

The theme of this post, besides the fact that I thought writing about pie dough was rather boring, really is control though.  If you do nothing else but pay attention to your treatment of the fat in a baking recipe you’ve got a good shot of success.

Assuming you’re not a measuring retard.

Ok and the torches aren’t so bad either.