1,504 easy and fully explained recipes, with +66K photos and 78 videos

This site uses only a few technical cookies necessary for its operation. By continuing to browse, you accept their use.
To find out more...

A little sugar anyway

I'm coming back to something I've already told you about, but which focused on brioche dough, so I'll try to generalize about these doughs, which are generally sweet, but can also be used in savory recipes.

4,725 5/5 (15 reviews)

Keywords for this post:Sugar Dough Coloring Baking Golden

Last modified on: November 14^th 2020

For this post: Comment Follow Send to a friend

A little sugar anyway

If you're making a tart or a tartelette, you're almost certainly going to use shortcrust pastry. For a dessert, it's very classic (and delicious), but what about for something savory: a quiche or a tourte, for example?

quiche lorraine

In that case, you'd be better off using a much less sweet shortcrust pastry to line your mold(s).

moule foncé

Less sweet (20 g vs. 110 g for 500 g flour), but still sweet, wouldn't it be worth doing away with sugar altogether?

The small amount of sugar won't affect the taste (so your quiche won't be sweet, phew), but it will affect the coloring of the pastry, bringing about a beautiful browning at the end of cooking. This browning is due to the caramelization of the sugar during cooking, the famous Maillard reaction.

pate colorée

Put another way, if you don't put that little bit of sugar in, your tart/quiche/tart, or rather its pastry, will remain a little whitish, dull, and therefore sadly unappetizing.

pate sans sucre

This small amount of sugar (5% of the weight of flour), which you can't taste, but which affects the coloring, is found in almost all doughs that you want to be golden-brown: shortcrust, deep-drawn, pizza, nacho, etc., and you shouldn't eliminate it thinking it's useless.

To sum up: you always need a little sugar in a flour-based dough intended for a savoury recipe, for the sake of beautiful colouring when cooked.

Lasts posts

Always secure your cutting board

When using a cutting board, it's very important that it's stable and doesn't move while you're cutting, for safety's sake. Boards have a natural tendency to slide on the work surface, but here are 2 ways to block them effectively.
July 1^st 20255625

Cherry clafoutis, with or without pits?

When it comes to cherry clafoutis recipes, there's often a camp of those who argue that you absolutely have to leave the stones in because it tastes better, and the other camp (myself included) who prefer cherries without stones, which makes a much more pleasant clafoutis to eat. But is it true...
June 29^th 20256935

Should potatoes be washed twice?

Let's say you have to make a recipe that includes potatoes, let's say sliced, you'll most likely proceed as follows: Peel the potatoes, wash them, slice them, wash them again, pat them dry and add them to your recipe. But there's a "but": depending on the recipe, the second washing may be a bad...
May 19^th 20252,300 15

Grilled bacon is much better in the oven

Some recipes call for thin slices of bacon to be cooked and added to the recipe, or to prepare one of those delicious breakfasts known as "à l'Anglaise".
April 25^th 20252,0635

The thermometer is your friend

There are many recipes or foods that require a (very) precise cooking temperature: foie gras, sugar for caramel, meats and fish, and not forgetting pastries. For these few examples, getting the cooking temperature wrong can spoil the whole recipe or dish: undercooked, it's no good or misses the...
April 10^th 20252,3795

See all posts Random post RSS feeds

Other pages you may also like

Choosing a chopping board

It's a no-brainer, surely? If you want a chopping board, just find a piece of wood, and Bob's your uncle! You can happily chop away with a knife and not damage the table or worktop. But in reality, it's a bit more complicated than that. You need to be careful what you are buying, in particular the...
May 8^th 201248 K4.6

The art of the charlotte

In cooking, a charlotte is a delicious moulded dessert, with biscuits around the outside that have been soaked in a flavoured syrup, filled with a light cream or mousse. The charlotte is left to set in the fridge before being turned out and served in slices. It is very light and a lovely sweet...
February 27^th 201341 K4.3

The 3 kinds of meringue

Meringue – what could be simpler? Just beaten egg whites with sugar added. This makes a fairly stiff mixture which can then be cooked in a cool oven to create those lovely, light confections. But in the world of professional patisserie, meringue comes in three different kinds. Even if the...
June 14^th 201361 K4.5

How to zest a fruit?

You will have no doubt noticed that many recipes call for the zest of citrus fruit. The zest is that outer layer of the skin which adds so much flavour to a dish. There are many different ways to peel off the zest and various tools are available. Here is a summary of the “dos and don'ts” of...
November 5^th 201344 K3.8

Steam for baking bread

What does steam have to do with bread-making? This is not only a bakers' secret, it is something you might not think of at all: if you make bread and bake it like a cake, you will end up with bread, but pale and with a thick, hard crust – a long way from the golden-brown crusty loaf you had in...
June 16^th 2021141 K4.5