There's puff pastry -- old-school and lovely for sure, but kinda meh in terms of producing things to eat warm (with the exception of turnovers. but that involves filling-fiddling). No, I'm talking croissants. Yeasted, tangy with sourdough and wrapped around your heart-attack-inducer of choice, butter. It's the perfect combo of exacting geometric symmetry and "leave-it-to-the-powers-that-be" yeast mojo. Plus eating one is such a nice thing to do for yourself, with the fine buttery crispness and warm chew spreading its loveliness over your palate and fingers.
The dough I like (similar, but slightly tweeked, to this one from Karen Bornarth and Roger Gural) is made from milk, malt, mother and a combo of white whole wheat and bread flour, with some salt to keep the gluten in shape, and just a little butter and dry yeast.
EDIT: Now with the actual recipe I use! Makes 24 pastries -- croissant, pains au chocolat, or a combination.
Dough (detrempe:)
400 g. bread flour
100 g. white whole wheat, regular whole wheat, or atta flour
60 g. sugar
15 g. salt
2.5 g. (1/2 tsp) malt powder
30 g. butter
135 g. water
135 g. milk
10 g. instant or active dry yeast
440 g. sourdough starter, fed 6-10 hours before
Combine the flours, salt, sugar and malt. Rub in the butter until it disappears.
Whisk the yeast into the water. Add the milk, yeast water and starter to the dry ingredients and mix with a spatula or on low speed with the paddle just until the dough comes together.
Spray or butter the inside of a gallon-sized zip-close bag, scrubbing the sides together to coat. Drop in the dough and flatten it out with your knuckles to the corners. Chill it nice and cold, preferably overnight, so it can rise low and slow, and helps keep the butter block cool as well.
Roll-in butter block:
340 g. butter
Basically, do this:
how much fun is it smacking the butter with a rolling pin? So much!! But this serves a purpose: the cold butter must stay cold but become malleable enough not to break apart when it's folded into the dough. Fold and roll with the help of the baking mat until the butter is a 10 inch square. Chill in the mat, flat.
The next day, slit the side and bottom of the zip-close bag and open it out flat. Dust the dough with flour, then flip it out onto the counter. With your fingers, press the cold dough out to a rectangle about 10x15 inches.
Flip the butter square level with one short side, leaving one-third uncovered.
Now fold the unbuttered third over the middle section, then the one buttered third on top of that... like folding a letter to put in an envelope. Seal the edges gently but firmly.
Lift up the rectangle and dust the counter with flour. Press with up-and-down motions with the pin diagonally to flatten the rectangle, until it is about 1/ inch thick. Roll the dough back out as large as you can, keeping the edges even. Aim for something like 9x21 inches and about 1/4 inch thick. Fold again like a letter. Wrap and rest at least an hour, then repeat once more. Chill again at least 3 hours (or overnight) before shaping.
Yep, because of the layers... you want to keep the magic. So no, there are no scraps when I make croissant (both classic and filled with almonds or ham and cheese) and their cousins pains au chocolat, because every bit of dough and every opportunity for rise is precious. For Pains au chocolat, rectangles:
Be sure that the seam ends up on the center bottom, or else it will flip over from the rising and unroll.
For croissant, a trapezoid
that is then triangulated and rolled, either around a filling or not:
then a short stint to let the yeast beast do its thing, producing an almost-unimaginably light balloony wobble, before being washed and baked:
sprightly and beautiful emerging from the oven, shattering with a good amount of chew right in the middle.
Oui, you betcha they're worth the effort. And needless to say, so are you.
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