Feuilletine

So, what is feuilletine? It’s a simple, crunchy, crispy wafer that you break apart into small pieces and add to certain pastries or candies to give them a little texture and crunch. We’d guess that commercial bakers probably use this stuff by the shovelful when they make up special desserts. And, since they use it in large quantities, they probably just buy it.

We happened to need just a small amount for a special dessert (you’ll see what it is later this week) we’re making, and we looked online to see if we could buy some. Talk about sticker shock! This stuff is pricey. We’re talking over a dollar an ounce. Maybe we can make some, instead.

It turns out that it’s actually quite easy to make feuilletine. It’s made from just a few ingredients: butter, sugar, egg white, flour, and water. We have no idea how someone can get away with charging over $16/pound! The recipe we use is exactly the one we found on Chef Rachida. Thanks to her, we saved some serious dough.

Print Recipe

5 from 9 votes

Feuilletine

Servings: 8 ounces

Author: Shawn

Ingredients

• 60 g unsalted butter, melted (4 Tbs)
• 100 g granulated sugar (1/2 cup)
• 35 g egg white (from 1 large egg)
• 60 g all-purpose flour (scant 1/2 cup)
• 40 g water (3 Tbs)

Instructions

• Add sugar to melted butter and whisk until dissolved. When cool, whisk in egg white. Whisk in flour to make a paste. Finally, whisk in water in three additions.
• Refrigerate for at least 1 hour to thicken.
• Preheat oven to 400°F.
• Scoop about 1/4 cup of batter onto a silicone baking mat and use a large spatula to spread to a thickness of 1/16 inch (you can use a specialized template, or two strips of plastic cut from an appropriate container to ensure an even thickness).
• Place baking mat on a sheet pan and bake for 8-10 minutes, or until edges are nicely browned and the centers are dry to the touch.
• Let cool on the sheet for 5 minutes, then peel off and break into pieces.

Ingredient discussion:

Well, there’s not much we can say about the ingredients; instead, we’ll tell you how to make some quick and easy “templates” for spreading the batter evenly. We happened to have a large plastic lid (those of you who have cats might recognize it as a well-washed lid from one of those buckets of cat litter), out of which we simply cut strips about an inch wide and 7-8 inches long. If you don’t have such a lid, you might be able to use thin plastic rulers, or use smaller lids cut into strips. Be creative. After all, if you’re like us, you might make feuilletine once a year, and that’s not often enough to buy special templates.

Oh, we do suggest that you weigh the ingredients; that way, your batter turns out with the correct viscosity.

Procedure in detail:

Dissolve sugar. Add the sugar to the warm melted butter and whisk. If you melted your butter in a saucepan, you might as well keep it in there to make this batter; it’s not much batter, and it doesn’t take much time, so why not? Keep whisking; the mixture will thicken a bit as the sugar dissolves. We don’t think it’ll dissolve completely, and we don’t think it matters. Ours didn’t dissolve completely and it was fine. Just make the effort to get at least some of the sugar to dissolve. Let the mixture cool.

Add egg white. After the sugar and butter has cooled, add the egg white and whisk to incorporate. The egg whites will add moisture that’ll help the sugar dissolve, making for a smoother batter.

Add flour and water. Add the flour and whisk to combine and make a thickish paste. Now, add the water, about a third at a time, whisking to incorporate. The original recipe said you might not need all the water, and you might not, but we did. You want a batter that’s smooth and spreadable, not runny, nor thick like paste.

Refrigerate. Cover the batter with plastic and refrigerate for about an hour. This will help the batter thicken up a bit, and give you time to search out something to use as thickness templates.

Preheat oven to 400°F. Place a rack in the upper third of the oven.

Spread. Place a silicone baking mat on a clean work surface, and set up your template strips. Scoop about 1/4 cup of batter in between the strips, and use a long spatula to spread the batter. If you don’t have plastic strips for a template, just spread the batter to about 1/16 inch thick. You should just about see the silicone mat through the batter.

Bake. Place the baking mat on a baking sheet and place in the oven. Bake about 8-10 minutes, watching carefully near the end to prevent burning, until the edges are a nice dark golden brown and the centers are dry to the touch. The center may be just a light brown at this stage, and that seems to be fine.

Cool. Let cool for about 5 minutes on the sheet, which will help to crisp the feuilletine, then peel off the silicone baking mats. Let cool completely.

Crush. Use your fingers to crush the feuilletine into small pieces, and store in an airtight container.

Now, we assume that you didn’t happen upon this recipe by accident, so you probably already have a plan for your feuilletine. If not, these would be great stirred into ganache to give it a crispy, crunchy texture. We will say that these are nice and crisp, a little sweet, and add a nice crunchiness to what we made (more on that later). You can’t beat spending 30 minutes or so to save a little bit of cash. Five stars.

Worth the trouble?