Other forms of viennoiserie (and of life)

Fermented-layered dough part III

Jun 27, 2020

So the world didn’t end this week. It sure felt like it was about to on Tuesday morning, as we watched the cars parked in front of our building shaking back and forth, and the blinds of the second-floor apartment aggressively swinging from one side to the other. That same unpredictable ruling force of nature that had kept us contained in our homes since the middle of March (hopefully reflecting on all the bad things we’ve inflicted upon the earth led by our insatiable, inflated, stupid, stubborn human egos) was now expelling all us out at the same time in Mexico City because of a 7.5 intensity earthquake that originated in La Crucecita, Oaxaca, killing seven people around that area.

From the sky, thanks to the prompt sound of the seismological alarm (and our not yet overcome collective PTSD from the 2017 earthquake), it must have looked like when a person steps over a colony of ants, except that compared to that ruling force, we are much smaller, defenseless, and insignificant than the ants are compared to us.

As soon as I confirmed that the only thing still trembling was my body (and the only being still freaking out was Totoro, our pug), I realized I forgot to wear a face mask, just like the rest of the neighbors, except for Bruno, my son (I was so proud), and an old guy who didn’t even get out of his apartment (probably because it took him that long to find it) and was just staring at us from the window. “At least we kept our distance”, said another neighbor, assuming that we were all thinking the same thing at the same time.

It is said that for an average inhabitant of Mexico City, there’s a standard probability of experiencing at least three devastating earthquakes in a lifetime (with a bunch of smaller, and not-so-small ones in between). My parents have already lived through three: 1957 (when the Angel de la Independencia fell), 1985, and 2017, which was the second one for me, and a first for my kids. So after some years of living in DF, you start to develop a sense of how intense an earthquake is, and kind of predict its severity; in other words, you know if you should just wait calmly for it to pass, or get on your knees and pray for your life. This one was a tad below that border. As it happened, I was thinking to myself: “it’s strong but not enough, so as long as it stays like this, we’ll be fine”. My fear was that that “semi-controlled” movement was only the preamble of a more powerful shake like it happened in 2017 when, literally, a second earthquake crashed into the first one.

What was interesting about the whole situation was that, even though my kids took all of the precautions they should’ve and acted accordingly, I realized they weren’t that scared anymore. So many bad things have happened this year that I think they’re beyond that. They’ve even started to be a little ironic about it. “¿So when is 2020 supposed to end?”, asked Bruno while we’re were walking up the stairs back into our apartment. It is not that they are indifferent to what is happening in the world, it seems more like they’ve just started to develop a strange kind of acceptance and resilience that I didn’t have at their age. I can see it whenever Mateo tells me about his dreams (which he’s gotten into a habit of doing); he has a recurrent one about living in a universe of colliding worlds —to which he just keeps adding adventures every time (most probably inspired by the images of video games)—, where he and his schoolmates are the protagonists of a battle to save the world against all sorts strange creatures; the more friends he founds along the way, the more powerful they all become, especially if they team up with the girls since they have “different powers” that complement each other. What really amazes me is that far from feeling scared at any point in the adventure, he is always excited about finding new ways to survive and outwit the monsters, even in fun ways, like spraying themselves with ketchup and playing dead.

That natural ability that my kids have to be optimistic about the future makes me feel a bit less scared. I want to be as sure as Bruno that this is just a bad year, and be able to afront it with his sense of humor. I also want to believe that criminals can be turned into better human beings with orange marmalade and delicious pastries like in Paddington 2 (2017), which we ended watching that evening on Netflix.

So, here goes another batch of shapes made with layered-fermented dough, to encourage you to make your life better by baking bread. I made some pieces with homemade orange marmalade in honor of Paddington, and magical thinking, and the beautiful minds of my kids.

…and it turns out that the monster was not such a monster after all… says the director of the jail in Paddington 2 as he concludes reading a bedtime story to the prisioners through the loudspeaker.

DANISH

(Makes 16 pieces)

Go to this post to get the recipe for the dough.

WHAT YOU NEED

Equipment:

A knife and/or a pastry cutter.
A tray.
Parchment paper.
A ruler or something to measure.

Ingredients:

Egg wash.
Powdered sugar or sugar glaze.
For the fillings I used leftover cream cheese from the guava rolls, paired with kumquat orange & triple berry homemade marmalade that I already had, and fresh mangos that I just sprinke with sugar and let rest for a while. Feel free to use what ever you like.
*To add a little sweetnes, you can top with powdered sugar o coat with a sugar glaze that you can make by boiling equal parts of sugar and water until it turns into syrup.

Preparation:

Cut half of the dough to work in two batches.

Roll it into a rectangle of approximately 4x4 inches, leave a little space around to cut the seams.

Cut 8 equal pieces, and then cut and shape each one into any of the figures shown in the drawing…

Put the pieces on a tray with parchment paper and let rest for around two hours, or until the pieces have doubled in size and make a gelatinous movement as you shake the tray.

When the pieces are proofed, preheat the oven at 180*C, and add the fillings like in the following video…