Jul 24, 2021
Updated: Jul 27, 2021
Croissants! Croissants! Croissants! It seems almost every post this week on Instagram is full of those layers of buttery, flakey, yummy and delicious French croissants. A couple of years ago I started to some research and tried a few recipes I found. After a few flops, undercooked, no layers or bread like attempts, I gave up. I fault no one but myself, as croissants is not the easiest of bread recipes but once you get the right recipe for your kitchen and the method that you prefer, it really is worth it!
I think like many food bloggers, we try so many recipes and in the end what I usually post is a modified version of a combination of recipes, methods and tweaks that worked for me. In some cases its hard to give the credit since it came from so many places, but in the case here - a major credit goes to a couple of recipe creators for which I could not have baked these croissants successfully. I highly recommend you go to their sites and read in detail the process because they spent a great deal developing not only the recipes, but the blog posts itself.
Butter Milk Pantry - Sara posts some amazing recipes and her explanations are VERY detailed. I can't give her enough praise for her work.
Gourmétier - Sylvain Vernay lives in Spain and his blog is mostly in Spanish I believe but like Sara, he recipes are wonderful, and the attention to detail is unmistakable as is his photography skills. Please visit his site, if only for the pictures which are quite extraordinary.
As all my baking on this blog, I heavily rely on a few tools that I will provide affiliate links which give me a very small commission of you choose to purchase from these vendors, I greatly appreciate it. Sharing my baking journal with all of you is something I really wanted to do, but as you probably know all these tools, ingredients and multiple attempts at MANY recipes, is costly. So every penny counts and I am grateful,
Ruler
Rolling Pin
Pizza cutter or long sharp knife
Scale
Parchment paper
Cling Wrap
Timer ( I use my iPhone)
500g bread flour
55g white sugar
10g salt
150g luke warm milk
150g luke warm water
8g dry yeast
260g unsalted butter, room temp
1 egg
20g milk
pinch of salt
A couple of hours before you start to shape the dough, remove your butter from the fridge and let it come to a slightly colder than room temperature. You want to be able to bend slices of butter, not have it melted.
Cut 2 sheets of parchment paper to a little more than 20cm by 40cm. Ultimately you want the butter 20cm x 40cm so you need a little more to fold over.
Once you weighed your butter as a whole, slice it to equal parts so you can lay over evenly on one the parchment papers. This will make it easier to create a butter block, instead of the traditional hammering at the butter until it's soft.
Lay the second piece of parchment paper over the butter and fold the edges around it.
Using a rolling pin, you want to try to create a block, 20cm x 40cm
Try to roll the butter within that size and keeping it even as possible in thickness.
Place the butter block in the fridge overnight
Microwave the milk and water together for about 30 seconds until it's Luke warm.
Add the yeast to the milk/water, give it a quick mix and set aside
Prep the Kitchen Aid Stand Alone Mixer with your dough hook
Add the bread flour, sugar and salt to the Kitchen Aid Mixer bowl and give it a quick mix
Add the milk / water mixture and mix on low for about 2 minutes. Continue mixing for 7-8 minutes on one notch higher.
Line a baking tray with parchment paper and transfer the dough onto the tray. Pressing the dough dough to make a rectangle shape. Cover with cling wrap and place the tray in the fridge overnight.
Dust your counter/work bench and your rolling pin with flour
Remove your dough from the fridge
Roll out your dough to 40cm x 40cm (Ok, if its slightly more)
Lightly dust the top with flour
Place the dough on a tray and back in the fridge for 30 minutes
Remove the dough and make sure its still about 40cm x 40cm, otherwise rollout
Remove the butter from the fridge and peel off one side of the parchment paper
Place the butter block on the dough and gently press down
Peel off the second or top parchment paper
Fold both sides of the dough lengthwise in order to wrap the butter.
Press gently with your rolling pin to seal it
Roll the encased dough/butter lengthwise to 60cm or slightly more x 28cm
Fluff the dough (on each side, slip your hands gently underneath and pull up the dough ensuring it is not sticking. ( I do this quite often throughout the process to help aerate the dough and prevent sticking as well as lightly flouring the surface and each stage0.
Dust off any excess flour on the surface of the dough
Fold I - In thirds, fold the top of the dough down, the fold the bottom third over the initial fold of dough. This is your first (1of 3) folds.
Allow a bit of overlap when you fold from bottom third up, it helps as your roll later.
Make sure the side with the overlap in always on your right side.
Wrap the dough tightly with cling wrap and freeze for 20 minutes
Lightly dust the counter with flour
Remove your dough from the freezer
Remember, overlap seam to the right
Roll the encased dough/butter lengthwise to 60cm or slightly more x 28cm
Fluff the dough
Dust off any excess flour on the surface of the dough
Fold II - In thirds, fold the top of the dough down, the fold the bottom third over the initial fold of dough. This is your second (2of 3) folds.
Make sure the side with the overlap in always on your right side.
Wrap the dough tightly with cling wrap and freeze for 20 minutes
Lightly dust the counter with flour if needed
Remove your dough from the freezer
Remember, overlap seam to the right
Roll the encased dough/butter lengthwise to 60cm or slightly more x 28cm
Fluff the dough
Dust off any excess flour on the surface of the dough
Fold III - In thirds, fold the top of the dough down, the fold the bottom third over the initial fold of dough. This is your third and last (3of 3) folds.
Make sure the side with the overlap in always on your right side.
Lightly dust the counter with flour if needed
Remove your dough from the freezer
Roll the encased dough/butter lengthwise to 60cm or slightly more x 28cm
Place back in freezer for 5-10 minutes if you feel the dough getting warm
Maintain even thickness throughout the rolling.
Dough will try to shrink, keep at it gently until you get at least 60cm x 28cm
You should have a nice rectangle now, lets even it up
If you have a pizza cutter and a roller, this will be easier
slice off a little oven the top and bottom in a straight line to even it out and help with the "puff"
Trim the left side as well in the same way. (leave the right side as is)
Make small marks along the base of the dough at 10cm intervals (10cm, 20cm, 30cm, etc)
Make small marks along the top of the dough at 10cm intervals but offset by 5cm (5cm, 15cm, 25cm, etc)
Using a ruler, cut diagonally from the 10cm to the top 5cm mark, continue until you have 11 triangles (and 2 smaller pieces)
Save the trimmings wrapped in cling wrap and store in freezer. See my Monkey Bread post
Your triangles might be warming up a bit at this point, place them on a tray and in the freezer for 10 minutes if so.
Place the triangle dough, one at a time on the counter to shape.
starting with the larger end, hold with one hand while the other hand stretch gently to the tip.
Roll up from the base of the triangle to the tip as evenly as possible.
Make sure the tip is tucked under the dough to keep in place
Transfer the shaped doughs onto the parchment lined tray (same tray you are using to bake them)
Give them enough space to accommodate the increase in size while proofing.
I usually have them diagonally at 45 degrees to fit more
Place your tray in a warm area for proofing for about 3-4 hours or until its increased size by 60-70%. Your dough should "jiggle" when its ready for the oven
When the dough is ready, preheat the oven to 200C 30minutes prior
Make the egg wash - mix 1 egg, 20g of milk and pinch of salt.
Brush lightly only the top of the dough, you don't want to seal the layers. Gentle. Avoid the sides
Immediately before placing the croissants in the oven, brush another layer of egg wash.
Place the croissants in the oven and bake 200C for 7minutes on Rack level 6 if you have a Breville Smart Oven otherwise middle rack if your standard oven.
Lower the heat to 180C and bake for another 13-15 minutes
Remove and transfer to a wire rack for cooling
Resist the temptation, let it cool!