Jamie Oliver's Sweet Pastry~

This is the last Jamie Oliver Friday I will do for awhile. There are a few more recipes I want to post but they are very seasonal and this is NOT the season for them, and then there is the one last recipe that requires a lot of wild game which my husband has brought home from the hunt and he will prepare it , in his time. This is the sweet pastry, which in the book is directly opposite the savory recipe I posted last week. I like this pastry but instead of using it as a fruit pie pastry as Jamie suggests, I will in the future use it as a ONE crust pie pastry for cream pies, or lemon meringue.The pastry is rich enough for me to be dessert by itself! You will need:

• 3 1/2 cups organic all purpose flour, plus extra for dusting ( *I did not have organic, just used regular)
• 1 cup icing (* confectioners' ) sugar
• 1 cup plus 2 tablespoons good quality cold butter , cut into small cubes
• zest of one lemon
• 2 large eggs
• a splash of milk (* and he means JUST a splash)
• flour for dusting

"Sift the flour from a height onto a clean work surface (* from a height?) and sift the icing sugar over the top. Using your hands , work the cubes of butter into the flour and sugar by rubbing your thumbs against your fingers until you end up with a fine crumbly mixture. This is the point where you can spike the mixture with interesting flavors, so mix in your lemon zest." "Add the eggs and milk to the mixture and gently work it together till you have a ball of dough. Flour it lightly . Don't work the pastry too much at this stage or it will become elastic and chewy, not crumbly and short. Flour your work surface and place the dough on top. Pat it into a flat round , flour it lightly , wrap in plastic wrap and put it into the fridge to rest for at least half an hour." Jamie Oliver I pulled this out of the oven around midnight and had to let it cool to taste it. The pastry is delicious, my winter apples are a disappointment. Even with the right amount of sugar, cinnamon, and lemon...the lack of flavor the apples show cannot be disguised. My lesson here is that if I am going to invest such rich ingredients and my time into a recipe I will make sure ALL the ingredients are worthy! I think my sheep will appreciate the remaining winter apples from our trees NOT baked into a pie. * asterisk denotes my comments or words