At Poilane, we make breads, sablés, and bakers' pastries.
A sablé is a cookie.
It has a very sandy texture, which
is where this name comes from.
Over the past decade, I've developed a range of sablés
of different grain flours.
Our iconic sablé is the wheat sablé.
And at the bakery we call them punitions
because my great-great-grandmother would
call her grandchildren, saying come and get
your little punishments, or punitions.
The rye flour sablé we're going to make today is one I have
a sweet spot for.
They're not very sugary.
But I will mention you're likely to not
be able to stop at just one.
And that is also part of the punishment.
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To make this recipe, we need eggs, sugar, butter, pinch
of salt, and some rye flour.
First step, we're going to froth the eggs and the sugar.
You can use a handheld mixer here.
I really wouldn't recommend using a stand-alone mixer
just because you probably don't have enough mass.
I use the handheld mixer to bring the sugar and the eggs
together.
Froth it up, and you can see these slight little air
pockets.
And this is a good sign.
I'm going to add the butter.
There is a lot of butter here, and do not try and shortcut
this.
This is what's going to make a sablé.
This butter is at room temperature
but should not get warm because you don't want the fats
from the water to separate.
I'm mixing this on low speed just until the butter
is incorporated.
It should take about a minute.
I've just creamed it up.
It just looks like you're starting to mix together
a purée,
I'm going to add the salt to the flour.
And this is just so that there's no big pockets of salt.
And I'm going to start bringing this together with the spatula
just because I don't want to have the flour flying out
of the bowl.
I started making the sablés only in the most recent years.
I've been eating them all my life.
In my apprenticeship, I first focused on the breads.
And then when I came back from college
I learned how to bake the sweet confections of our bakery.
At this stage, the dough is delicate,
so don't go on high speed.
Stay on the slower speeds.
It will also help you not create a disaster.
Once the ingredients have come together
it may look like the dough is a little grainy.
It comes in pieces.
That's absolutely fine, and that's why we refrigerate it.
At this point, you're going to take half and just
put them together.
So you can use your wooden spoon,
or you can use a dough scraper.
Here, I'm just going to make sure that the dough comes
together a little bit.
And just so that it refrigerates faster,
I'm just going to make a flat square.
Sometimes the dough gets a little sticky.
In that case, you can use a dough scraper
to put it onto your plastic wrap.
To refrigerate the dough, I use some plastic wrap.
But you're just as welcome to use some parchment paper
or some beeswax paper.
The main thing here is you want to keep it airtight to avoid
the sablé dough to crust.
You see the dough is really supple, really smooth.
And if you were to bake the dough at this point,
it would just become one big sheet of cookie dough.
This is why we're refrigerating it, shaping it, and baking it.
I'm going to store those two pieces of dough
in the refrigerator for 30 minutes.
If you're not going to proceed with the recipe at this point,
you can freeze this dough for up to three months.
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The dough has cooled for 30 minutes,
and it's time to spread it out and cut out our cookies.
If you're working on a really hot day, what you can do
is spread out the dough and refrigerate it again
before you cut out the cookies.
I'm going to flour ever so slightly the surface
to remove any remaining water that
might help the dough stick.
And then using a rolling pin, flouring this one,
as well, a little bit, I'm going to spread out the dough.
The dough is pretty thick, and it rolls out relatively easily.
I like my cookies on the thin side.
And as I'm doing, I'm just getting
the floral flavors of rye.
This is really something that I absolutely adore.
In baking these cookies, I realize that a sweet cookie
is just a great way of explaining the tastes
and flavors of a grain.
Now, when it's nice and spread you
can use a dough scraper if it's too sticky underneath.
I like to taste a little bit of the dough.
That was one of my favorite things in the bake-house--
quality control.
I'm going to flour up my little cookie cutter.
I line a baking sheet with some parchment paper.
And I cut out my little cookies.
Now, try and be efficient here because every time you
have to reroll the dough you're heating up the dough.
You're overworking the butter.
And this is very inefficient and does
change the structure of the final cookie.
So here I have my little sablé.
This one is erring a little bit on the thicker side.
But here you have it.
It's ready to be put on the baking sheet.
No matter how cool your environment
is, once these cookies are cut out,
make sure that you refrigerate them before you cook them.
By refrigerating the dough at this point,
you are avoiding it from spreading out while baking.
I'm using the dough scraper here.
And especially in your first bakes
you might have a hard time grabbing these cookies
without deforming them a little.
That's fine.
Make sure that you put them at a regular distance
apart from one another.
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I'm done cutting out my sablés, and I'm going to cover them up
with some parchment paper, putting them in the fridge,
just to protect them.
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Once the sablés are ready to bake, uncover them.
Check for their size.
As you put them in the refrigerator,
maybe a few have slid out.
You can use a small spatula to replace them.
If two sablés are touching each other,
they'll stick together during baking.
So we're good to go.
They all have their individual space.
I'm going to put them in the oven for 12, 15 minutes.
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When your cookies are out of the oven,
let them cool on the sheet until you can manipulate them
with your bare hands.
Around the rims they become golden.
And on darker flours like rye it may
be dark, chocolaty brown color.
It shouldn't be any lighter than this one.
This is a good range of the colors
that you should have once your cookies are well done.
As they're cooling, you'll have the sweetness of the sablés
come and tickle your nose and call for them to be eaten.
But do wait until they're entirely cooled.
And set them out on a plate so you can enjoy them
with some tea and ice cream.
I like to have them plain or soaked in coffee.
Soaking your cookie into a hot drink will change its flavor.
And you will be quite surprised to discover a whole new world
by just having this simple gesture.
Parfait.
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Félicitations on finishing this class.
I hope you'll continue baking at home.
Whether it's cookies, breads of sourdough,
some rye, a brioche, a pain de mie, or bread cooking,
practice these recipes.
Learn from them.
Share them.
And enjoy the process.
If you've forgotten everything else,
come back to your five senses.
This is the way you are going to bake in the Poilane spirit.
And on that note, bon appetit.
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