Ingredients

  • 250 g of flour
  • 5 g of yeast powder
  • 150 g of beef suet or vegetable fat, chopped or shredded suet packaged
  • 125 ml of cold water (about)
  • a pinch of salt

Method

  • STEP 1 Sift the flour, baking powder and salt in a large bowl. Add the shredded suet and mix together well.
  • STEP 2 Make a well in the center of the flour, add water gradually into the mixture. Mix the flour in water until soft dough forms.
  • STEP 3 Turn out on a floured surface, gently knead for a few minutes with your hands well floured. Cover the dough and refrigerate for 30 minutes to rest before using.

Notes

If you want to make a sweet dough, add about 25g of caster sugar to the water, making sure it is dissolved before adding to the flour.
Suet pastry is quite a soft dough soaked and sticking to your hands. It is worth rubbing some 'flour on your hands when handling it.
Suet is a very hard fat, and will not rub into flour with butter, margarine or lard. So, you'll find it in all the shops of small packages already shredded and ready to use. Trying to get beef tallow by a butcher is a waste of time these days.
Adding a touch more water to the dough makes it very nice gnocchi. It will also shredded suet in many recipes for Christmas pudding and fruit-mince / ground beef used for making mince pies with at that time of the year party.