Recipe: Patty Shells or Vol-Au-Vents

Hi Mel :-), I think that the best way to make these would be to use frozen puff pastry if it is available in Australia since making puff pastry from scratch is quite labor intensive. Here, we can buy frozen puff pastry or frozen puff pastry shells (vol-au-vents)made by Pepperidge Farms. Here is what you can do if you can by frozen puff pastry:

Patty Shells or Vol-Au-Vents

If using puff pastry made from scratch, preheat your oven to hot, 450 degrees F.

Roll puff pastry to 1/8 inch thickness. For each patty shell, cut 3 three inch circles of dough with a biscuit cutter. Place the first circle on a baking sheet and brush it with egg yolk. Do not let egg drip on sides.

Using a slightly smaller cutter, cut out center of second pastry circle to make a ring. Turn this ring over and place it on perimeter of the first pastry circle. Brush with egg yolk.

Press the smaller biscuit cutter into the third pastry circle but do not cut through it. Place this on top of the ring and brush with egg yolk. Bake 10 minutes. Reduce heat to 350 degrees F and bake 20 minutes longer, or until golden and dry.

Remove from oven briefly and remove the indented center of the topmost layer of pastry with a sharp knife. Return the shell to the oven to dry. (With the frozen vol-au-vents, here, I think that is about 5 minutes). Fill the vol-au-vents with a creamed mixture such as chicken or seafood, covering or topping with the removed centers. I often fill puff pastry shells with Chicken a la King.

Let me know if you need a recipe to make puff pastry from scratch. The information I just gave you is from The New York Times Cookbook by Craig Claiborne and there is a recipe for making puff pastry from scratch should you need it.