Somehow, even pastry week managed to sneak in a technical challenge that didn’t involve baking, continuing the theme of this season of Great British Baking Show. But while this theme often brings delicate and stylized pastries that tend to put some contestants at a disadvantage, this week’s signature challenge gave everyone a decent chance to show off their puff pastry chops by making sweet vol-au-vents. The simple pastry, which is as much an edible serving dish as it is a specific recipe, offers an open-ended, kick-up-the-creativity opportunity for the final five remaining tent-dwellers.
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These days, the vol-au-vent and its mini-sized sibling, the bouchée à la reine, most often show up as small, savory appetizers filled with any sort of cream-sauced meat or vegetable. The name of the dish means “flying in the wind” which doesn’t refer to the bakers’ chances blowing about in the tent, but rather to the lightness of the pastry, which is usually shaped like a pot with a lid: round, hollowed out, ready to be filled. Unfortunately, it is often less “flying in the wind” and more “leadenly glued to an hors d’oeuvres tray,” but that’s beside the point.
