Pastry Lattice Crown

First things first, pop the flour and icing sugar in a bowl and mix together. Rub in the butter until it forms a rough crumb. 

Next, pop in the egg yolks and mix to bring the pastry dough together. If the pastry is still too dry, add 1-2 tbsp of ice cold water until it comes together nicely. 

Tip your pastry out on to a clean surface and gather into a ball of dough, wrap the dough in cling film and then chill for at least 30 minutes.

Once it’s chilled, roll out your pastry into a large circle about 1/2cm thick.

Cut the dough into 12 strips about 2 cm wide. – if you have a pastry cutter with a fluted edge use this to create a lovely finish to your strips. 

Turn a large oven proof mixing bowl (glass or metal) over and lightly grease with butter.

Now to create the pastry lattice effect; lay one row of strips across the bowl. Take a new strip of pastry and lay it crosswise against the row of strips. Lift up alternate strips so the new crosswise strip goes over, under, over, under. You will now have weaved your first crosswise strip.

Repeat with the remaining crosswise strips until you have a complete weave across the entire bowl, wow look at that!

Place the bowl with the pastry weave into the fridge for 30 minutes to chill before baking. - this is an important step to ensure the lattice holds its shape while baking.

Preheat your oven to 220℃/200℃/Gas Mark 8.

Once your pastry has chilled, lightly brush with an egg wash and then pop into the oven and bake for 20-25 minutes or until golden brown.

Once baked removed from oven and leave to cool before lifting the pastry lattice from the bowl.

Spray the pasty crown with the gold shimmer to create that extra sparkle! 

The pastry lattice is very delicate to handle very gently. Now it is time to crown your dessert for that extra WOW!