Hi, all!

Neither of my grocs cary King Arthur pastry flour.  Dastardly!  One only hasArrowhead Mills Pastry Flour; the other has NO pastry flour.  Beastly!

Has anyone tried Arrowhead Mills?

I know you can make your own pastry flour—any brand combos that worked well?  I know Rose mentions brands can vary, so I thought I’d see if anyone has had success.  This will be for the Flaky Cream Cheese crust.

Many thanks!

—ak

p.s. I know I can mail order, but I don’t really want to.

I never really knew one could make pastry flour.

You can approximate pastry flour by mixing two flours, one with less protein than pastry and one with more.  It isn’t true pastry flour, though, and I prefer Wondra to the cake flour/AP blend.  I make the cream cheese crust with Wondra- works perfectly.  And I will make it with bleached AP from time to time, if I’m out of Wondra.  But then I’m very careful not to work it too much and to choose a presentation that won’t be marred by a bit of shrinking.  And I’m also careful to err on the side of underbaking rather than overbaking.

Thank you, Julie!  I would have tended to OVER baking to get a crisp crust, so that’s really helpful.  Do you err to underbaking (rather than over) when you use wondra,  too?

I use Bob’s Red Mill Pastry Flour.  I often sub half the AP flour and use Pastry Flour in it’s place ( not in Rose’s recipes).

Walmart should carry it.  You can also get it on line in a larger quantity.

http://www.walmart.com/ip/Bob-s-Red-Mill-Whole-Wheat-Pastry-Flour-5-lb-Pack-of-4/17340041

Thanks, FG!!!

Julie, I actually found a post of yours (apricot marscipone tart - yum) that has your hints.  I think I replicated them on my PPB updates post, as well, so I’m good!  Golden is better than russett! Overbaking encourages shrinking!  Got it!!!!!!!!

The crust shouldn’t be too pale, you do want some color, but overbaking to a russet color will increase shrinking.  Still tastes good, though