Let's Go to Paris...Classic Croissants in No Time
- emilybowmanbaking
- Jul 1, 2020
- 3 min read
Updated: Sep 1, 2020
Classic Croissants
From Bruno Albouze
Takes 3.5 hours on Day One and about 4 hours on Day Two
Ingredients:
1 cup of warm water
2 packets of active yeast OR 4 teaspoons of fresh, active yeast
3 1/2 cups of flour
3 teaspoon of salt
1/4 cup of sugar
2 tablespoons of warmed butter (1/4 of one stick, microwaved for about 6 seconds)
Process:
DAY ONE:
Combine 1 cup of warm water with 2 packets of active yeast OR 4 teaspoons of fresh yeast in a bowl or measuring cup
Mix 3 1/2 cup of flour (I use All Purpose), 3 teaspoons of salt, and 1/4 cup of sugar into a medium size bowl and combine. Then add the liquid yeast and mix into the dry bowl, with the softened butter
Mix all ingredients with a fork and lightly flour a surface to begin kneading the dough till it all comes together (about 3-5 minutes)
Let the dough sit for 2 hours at room temperature
After letting dough sit and rise, pat dough into a rectangle like shape and wrap in plastic wrap to sit in the refrigerator overnight
DAY TWO:
Make a butter slab (yes a slab) with one stick of butter. Put the unwrapped stick in a plastic, sandwich bag and seal the top of it. Roll out the butter inside of the bag with a rolling pin till butter looks evenly spread and fills all corners of the bag
Place the bag of butter into the refrigerator to stay firm and unwrap the dough from sitting overnight and flour a surface to begin rolling the dough
Roll the dough into a 15" by 7" rectangle. Unwrap the butter slap by slitting the corners of the ziplock bag and peeling back the plastic. Once it is out of the plastic, place the butter slab onto one half of the dough. Fold the other half to cover the butter and match up the ends of the dough
Next roll the dough into another rectangle (roll out from the center to the outside) of 24" by 8". Once rolled out, fold the LEFT side 2/3 of the way and fold the RIGHT side to meet it 1/3 of the way
Fold the dough in half and roll the dough (from the center out again) until it is 24" by 8" again. Fold the LEFT to the center and the RIGHT side over top of that
Wrap the dough and refrigerate for one hour or you can skip this part if your butter is still firm and not melting
Roll the dough out and cut it in half with a knife (you should see the butter and dough layers!!) and keep one half out, while rewrapping the other half to put in the refrigerator
Preheat the oven to 375°
Now, roll the one half out till it is pretty thin (vague I know but till the dough is about a few centimeters thin) or you can roll it till it is an 18" by 9" rectangle
Once rolled out, start cutting the dough into triangles starting at edge and continuing in a triangle pattern till no dough is left
Take each triangle strip of dough and roll from the widest end to the tip to make that classic croissant shape. Continue this movement on all of the strips of dough and if you want add chocolate chips or any filling to the dough BEFORE you roll it
Mix one egg and a pinch of salt in a cup
Place all of the rolled croissants on a baking sheet (lined with parchment paper) and brush on the egg and salt mixture onto the tops and sides of croissants to give them that delicious golden, brown outside when it bakes
Place baking trays into oven for 12 minutes or until the tops are a deep golden brown color and the bottoms are just getting crispy
Let the croissants continue to bake on the baking sheets and once cool remove
Enjoy and feel like you really are in a Paris cafe!!
Photos to show the layers you should see, how some of the folds will be, and how the triangle cuts will look
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