Hi, Margie. You're asking some great questions, but I think it would be helpful to clarify some terms. Pate Brisee lands somewhere between pastry dough and a cookie; it's considered to be a "mealy" dough, with a very fine grain. It's well suited to pressing into tart shells, for a cookie-like crust. Adding an egg puts some structural strength back into the dough, which is substantially "shortened" by incorporating the fat so thoroughly into the flour. It depends on the application, but in general the amount of egg should be about 10% of the weight of the flour in the formula. If you're looking at sweet yeast doughs, they can handle more eggs. Brioche or challah can sometimes have as much as one egg for every cup of flour, but very small amounts of water, since much of the dough's hydration is coming from the eggs. As for the puff pastry question, I'm not sure what you're referring to with the term "straight dough"? That term is generally used to refer to a method of mixing yeast bread. As for why you can roll quick puff more than a "regular" pie dough, the ratio of flour to fat in a quick puff is about 50-50. The fat is kept in larger chunks, to create steam and loft when baked. quick puff pastry usually gets 2 (3 at the most) fold; if you do more than that, you begin to break down the chunks of fat, and the layers become less distinct. Even for that recipe, more folding can lead to diminishing returns for quality. I hope this helps. Susan

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