Best Butter Croissant

The secrets to making perfect pure beurre croissants. Let me cut it in half and see what happens. Croissants are the most revered breakfast pastries. Their delicate flaky layers and buttery flavor make them a favorite around the world. So for the croissant dough, you will need a one-to-one ratio of cold water and milk, fresh yeast, sugar, and honey. Stir that up and add two types of flours, bread and all-purpose. Add the salt and the room-temperature butter. Mix for five minutes on low speed until it comes together, like so. Then increase mixer speed to medium-high and knead for six minutes or until the dough pulls away from the sides of the bowl. Transfer dough on the countertop without the use of any extra flour. Now, let's do the windowpane test. Looks awesome. That means the gluten is well developed and your dough is ready to rise. Shape the dough into a tight round and transfer to a lightly oiled bowl. This helps prevent the dough from sticking and allows for easier removal later on. And place the dough in the refrigerator overnight. So now the $1,000,000 question. What matters the most in croissant making? The answer is high-fat butter. Higher butterfat means less water, therefore tastier and ideal for the lamination. So you simply want to turn the room-temperature butter into a 6 by 6 inches, 15 by 15 centimeters square. In order to achieve the perfect butter block. All right, let's grab our croissant dough from the refrigerator. It's been approximately 12 hours. Look at this pretty thing. Amazing, right? So unless you work in a professional kitchen and have one of these dough sheeters, you won't need to split your fermented croissant dough into two portions. But at home, it's a different story. Deflate the dough and shape into two tight ovals. Let rest 10 minutes and turn them into narrow rectangles like so. And place on a frozen tray and freeze for 20 minutes. Then flip and freeze again. Next, and just about 15 minutes before giving the turns, leave your butter block out. However, during the warm season, your butter block won't take that long before it becomes supple and ready to be used. Just about five minutes. Get the croissant dough out of the freezer and roll out into two 6 by 16 inch, 15 by 40 centimeter rectangles, about twice the length of the butter block. Place butter on top of the dough and fold over the butter, encasing it in dough. Rotate to a quarter turn and gently press down with a rolling pin. To follow, and with a cutter, make a deep straight cut on each border. This trick helps the butter to get evenly distributed throughout the dough, right from the beginning. Flatten a little bit and let rest 10 minutes in the refrigerator before giving the first turn. If you do have a dough sheeter though, skip it. So here we go. We're going to give a double turn. Fold, tour double first. Roll out the dough into a longer strip. Keep all edges as straight as possible. Starting rolling it out from the center of the dough towards the edges and not from one side of the dough all the way to the other side. This technique helps to keep the dough at an even thickness. Fold in approximately one sixth of the dough from the left edge inward. Then bring the other edge of the dough to meet the folded edge. Then the right third is folded in. And fold the entire folded dough in half, like you would a book. All right, so now that's going to go in the refrigerator. I'm going to cover it with parchment paper I saved from the butter block. That's going to go in the fridge for approximately 30 minutes, even longer. All right, to follow, we are going to give the single turn. Tour simple. Roll out dough into a 6 by 27 inches, 15 by 70 centimeter rectangle, like so. And in order to create straight, clean edges, the edges may be trimmed prior folding. Then the dough is folded in thirds, like a business letter. Now you want to flatten the laminated croissant dough into an 8 and a half inches, 22 centimeter squared slab, called baton in French. And place in a refrigerator an hour to rest. In the meantime, I'm going to make the custard for the escargot pastry, pain au raisin. Once the custard is cooked, spread it over a frozen baking tray lined with plastic wrap. Let cool and refrigerate. And just before use, smooth it out using your stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment. Pastry cream, crème pâtissière, belongs to the pastry fundamentals, the mother of all custards. Not done yet. Next in the agenda, I am going to drain raisins that have been soaked in rum. Normally, you would get them plumped in water. Soyon fou. And the secret ingredient, candied orange peels. All right, so now I am going to grab the first croissant baton from the refrigerator. I'm going to cut it in two batons and freeze them for 15 minutes. And then keep the dough refrigerated. Roll out dough so then it fits in the widest setting of the rollers. Gently feed the dough through the pasta machine, taking care to support the dough as it passes through. As the dough becomes thinner, gradually decrease the thickness setting on the pasta machine and continue to pass the dough through until it reaches 5 mm thickness. Voila! And you should end up with an 8 x 19 inches, 20 x 48 cm rectangle. As you can witness, using a heavy-duty pasta machine helps a lot. It's like having a small dough sheeter at home. Otherwise, refer to my written recipe for more details at brunoalbouze.com. So, follow the same rolling protocol for the escargots, chocolatines, and regular croissants. Same length, width, and thickness. Yet, half croissant baton gives you 16 pains raisins. Spread the chilled pastry cream evenly. Add the raisins and the diced candied orange peels and roll into 2 logs. And cut each log into 8 escargots. Arrange them on a baking tray, egg wash, and freeze. For the chocolate croissant, known as chocolatine or pain au chocolat, cut croissant dough sheet into 8 rectangles. Add chocolate sticks or discs. It would do the job if you don't have any. And roll into tight logs. Egg wash and freeze. Next batch, croissant. Roll out dough into the same thickness, 5 millimeters. Cut in half, then into lengthwise, and make 2 triangles out of each rectangle. Make sense? Now, you've got 8 65 to 70 grams croissants. Now, here is where things get interesting. Some pastry chefs, indeed, choose to make incisions from the base of each triangle before rolling them up to form croissants. This additional step increases the width of the croissant, resulting in a slightly different appearance. With the base of the triangle held in one hand, elongate the dough by very gently stretching from the base and continuing all the way to the tip of the triangle. Starting at the base of the triangle, roll towards the tip. Press down the tip to seal the rolled croissant. So yet, you want to egg wash your croissants twice before going to the freezer and once proofed and ready to bake. Freezing croissants overnight strengthens the gluten, improving final results. All right, feels like my family brunch menu is approaching. So the night before, get everything ready to go. Pain au raisin will be proofed inside buttered and sugared cake rings. That trick will make them super crispy. I can't wait any longer. Let's proof for 2 to 3 hours at 25 degrees Celsius, 77 Fahrenheit, and bake in a fan oven at 180 degrees Celsius. All right, let's bake this bad boys and see what happens. Simply amazing. Now you can make it. Remember, the only way to taste it is to make it. To get the full recipe and hundreds more, visit my blog at brunoalbouze.com. If you liked the video, please give me a thumbs up and click down below to the subscribe button. It is a universal truth that a great day will always start with a good breakfast. Have a gorgeous day. See you very soon.