Vol-au-vents with Devilled Egg filling

Work has been busy. I shan't bore you with it but I'm very pleased my friend Lorna recommended a kick ass concealer for under the eyes as it's made me look alive for the past few weeks (Nars Radiant Creamy Concealer put on with an Ecotools Airbrush Effect brush for those interested). I also invested in a good serum for night time which is my new thing. Much better than moisturiser and you only need a little of it so a bottle goes a long way.  

Anyway, my brain hasn't really been processing anything outside of work so I required help with what I should make. As my work colleagues eat most of what I make I thought that I should ask them for ideas and boy did they have some. The one that caught my eye was the request for vol-au-vents as they are so out of fashion and I remember them as being THE party food. What happened to them?! Where did they go?! I mean puff pastry cases filled with amazing things that we all secretly love – prawn cocktail, egg mayo, chicken mix. 

So really the main decision when making vol-au-vents are what the hell to put in them. Mine were filled with devilled egg mixture for two reasons: 1. I had a lot of eggs in the house as The Thew had randomly bought about a million and 2. We'd had had them recently at our neighbours and they were delicious. Therefore they fit the ingredients I had at home and the necessity for something a bit out of fashion to go into those pastry cases. I’m going to be honest and say that the actual vol-au-vents were a pain, and you may as well buy the frozen ready to bake, but it was good fun filling them and they tasted great. 

Ingredients 

Vol-au-vents

1 x pack of ready to roll puff pastry (do not be tempted to by ready rolled, its not thick enough)

1 x egg, beaten 

1.    Preheat the oven to 200°C/GM 6.

2.    Roll the pastry out to about 5mm thick.

3.    Cut out circles – I did mine with a 5cm cutter. Then using a smaller circular cutter (this was a bugger to find and I ended up using the large end of a piping nozzle) cut in the middle of the circle to about half the depth of the pastry. You’re ensuring that you can easily scoop out the middle.

4.    Put on a baking tray and brush the tops (not the sides) with egg. Then bake for 10 minutes.

5.    Take out and allow to cool before taking out the middle. You’ll probably need to cut around the mark you’ve made with the smaller cutter before putting all the excess pastry out (this is a bit of a pain).

6.    Then pop back in the oven for another 5-6 minutes to firm up and dry out. Take out and cool until you want to fill.

 

Filling

5 x eggs

Mayonnaise

Cayenne pepper

Mustard powder

Balsamic vinegar

Smoked paprika

 

1.    Hard boil the eggs. It takes about 18 minutes from having cold water covering them.

2.    Cool and then peel. Cut in half and scoop out the yolks. Finely chop the egg whites and leave to one side.

3.    Mush the yolks up in a bowl. Now I haven’t out quantities as it’s more about personal taste, how big the yolks are etc etc. Add about 50ml of mayo, a sprinkling of cayenne pepper, 1 tsp of mustard powder and a scant tablespoon of vinegar (you can use white wine vinegar). Mix together and taste. Maybe a bit of salt, maybe more cayenne pepper – taste and see.

4.    Once you’re happy with the yolk mix add the chopped up whites. Then fill the cases with the mixture.

5.    I finished mine with a sprinkling of smoked paprika as it adds a little something. I recommend it.