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I need to store a no yeast dough (water, flour, butter, salt) for verenyky for about 40 hours.

What would be the best place: fridge or freezer?

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    I saw in comments what your dough is for, so I took the liberty of adding that information to your question. Since I was there anyway, I removed your "greetings" and "thank you" just because we don't do that here. Welcome to Seasoned Advice!
    – Jolenealaska
    Oct 24, 2014 at 17:04
  • You know you could freeze the whole, filled, uncooked dumplings too, right? Cook however many you want, whenever you want them. Food doesn't get much faster/easier than that!
    – Jolenealaska
    Oct 24, 2014 at 17:14
  • Yes, of course, but I need a help of my friends, who will come over in 40 hours and my job was to make a dough in advance ;) Thank you. Oct 24, 2014 at 21:55

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I suppose we are talking about pâte brisée / salty pie crust or similar dough?

As 40 hours is scant 2 days and you are not using any ingredients that will spoil quickly, a fridge should suffice. Advantage: use right away w.o. thawing. Also avoids condensation from thawing, but propper wrapping should take care of that problem anyway.

My calculation: If you freeze the dough it'll need a couple of hours in the fridge to thaw, so assuming 2-4 h until frozen, 6-8 h to thaw (depending on shape): What difference makes 30 h at -18°C instead of 4°C?

I'm speaking from 30+ years of experience (we make a LOT of cookies here in SW Germany around Christmas). Neither my Mom nor I ever had mold problems after two days in the fridge.

One drawback though: If you prepare the dough and don't get around to baking it, the feezer would have been the better choice.

EDIT after clarification:
I guess we're talking something akin to pasta dough here? IMHO the same principles apply. I'd be a bit wary if you use eggs. Use fresh eggs or pasteurized, if you can get them.

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Dough grows moldy in the fridge after several days. While it might keep 40 hours, it's more secure in the freezer.

Depending on what you want to make with it, it might be better to work it from cold or from warm. If it is better from cold (e.g. pie crust, pierogi should behave similarly), freezer is perfect. If it is better from warm, you'll have to plan for sufficient time to unfreeze and let it warm up. In this case, the fridge might be better despite some mold risk.

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  • If it's a pie crust, on the UK cooking show 'The Best', one of the guys mentioned that you can take the frozen doughball and put it through the coarse side of a box grater ... then just pack the shavings into the pie plate, clean up the top edge, and you're ready to bake ... no thawing required.
    – Joe
    Oct 23, 2014 at 23:45
  • @Joe I tend to roll my crust when it's made, then put it in the form and put the whole form with the dough in the freezer. If I only have a short time to baking, it's just chilled. If it's a long time, it gets completely frozen. Works great. Not for covered pies, of course, but I doubt that you can use the grater trick to make something cohesive enough to hold up as a top crust.
    – rumtscho
    Oct 24, 2014 at 9:26
  • I haven't tried it, but I'd think if you sprinkled it in a circle, then pressed it w/ a rolling pin, you could probably pull off a top crust, too.
    – Joe
    Oct 24, 2014 at 15:20
  • It's a dough for varenyky, btw. I have done it few times before, but have never had to store it for more than 6-8 hours. Thank you for your replies! Oct 24, 2014 at 15:37

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