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I can’t tell you how many recipes, methods and processes I have tried over the years to get the perfect croissant. It probably nears the hundreds of trials from pancake croissants, to greasy mess, I don’t think there is a way to mess it up that I haven’t made happen (I’ve probably invented new ones too). Well today, it is with great great joy that I come to you with THE recipe and more importantly all the tricks to make puffed up, light and fluffy croissants at home. I know I know this intro makes it sound like I just found the cure to cancer but the struggle to finally get these right was oh too too real. I do apologize for the quality of the photos, most of them were taken at night time after a long day of whatever I was doing on those days but probably something that involves the gym. I’ve gathered here all the tips and tricks so you may too, enjoy the deliciousness of a homemade croissant.

The poolish:

The first few croissant recipes I tried did not involve a poolish (a poo-what?). It’s a type of leavening method that makes everything taste so good. And if that wasn’t reason enough, I find it also makes it easier to work with the dough. So, combine 30g of water and 30g of milk and warm up to 110-115F. Control the temperature with a thermometer. This is important, too hot will damage the yeast and too cold won’t activate it. Follow the instructions of the active dry yeast you’re using. Add in 5g of active dry yeast and stir until dissolved. Add 50g of flour and mix. Loosely close the container (or film it with some holes so the poolish can breathe) and let stand at room temperature 30 minutes.

In the original recipe, it is suggested to dust a bit of flour over the poolish before filming the container. If you chose to do this, you will need to collect the flour from the 250g allocated for the recipe. After 30 minutes or so the poolish should have at least doubled in size.

The croissant dough:

Combine 62.5g of water and 62.5g of milk and warm up to 110-115F. Weigh the 30g of sugar and take a tbsp out of it to add to the liquid. Add 5g of active dry yeast and let stand 5 minutes or until foam starts to form. Some people argue that there is no need to activate dry yeast before mixing and yes it does work but not as well. This is also a good time to make sure that the yeast is still active and not go through the whole process to realize that the croissants just aren’t proofing.

Meanwhile, melt 25g of butter and let it cool down before putting it in the bowl of your stand mixer with 30g of sugar (minus the tbsp taken to activate the yeast) and 5g of fleur de sel. You may also use regular salt. At this point I like to whisk it a little to help the salt and the sugar dissolve.

Add 250g of flour over this. The reason is that we want to create a barrier between the salt/sugar and the yeast which can be damaged when in direct contact with these elements. Over the flour, add the water/milk/yeast mixture and 50g of poolish.

Now comes in what made SO MUCH DIFFERENCE for me, at home, when we don’t have powerful refrigeration or a dough sheeter and we need to work by hand: do not over kneed your dough. Actually don’t even kneed it, simply mix until all the ingredients are combined and a dough forms. You don’t want it to be lumpy but it is ok if it is not perfectly smooth. Work your dough on the counter until smoother and believe that the rest will finish happening during the lamination process. Over kneeded dough (especially if using bread flour) will be very very very very VERY hard to roll out. That means you will be tempted to push down harder on the rolling pin to get to where you want to go squishing the layers in the process.

Form somewhat of a rectangle with the dough, film it and place in the freezer for 1 hour. The goal is to stop the yeast from working so the dough needs to get cold fast. After 1 hour, place it in the fridge and leave it overnight. Note the thickness of the dough. Not too thin because we don’t want it too loose its strength and definitely not too thick or it won’t be able to get cold and will keep proofing in the fridge (about 2cm).

The next day, take the dough out of the fridge, air bubbles will have formed despite it being in the fridge, you need to roll them out and place in the freezer while we prepare the butter block. On a piece of parchment paper large enough to wrap the butter place it in a shape of a rectangle.

Fold the parchment paper around so that it completely wraps around the butter. Now you need to work that butter, press it and bang it with the rolling pin to make it more ‘plastic’. This is what will allow it to be spread along the dough without breaking so work it work it work it. Place it back in the fridge for 5 to 10 minutes but no more or the butter will go back to its original texture.

When both the butter and the dough are ready, remove from the fridge/freezer and check their consistency. They should be identical if not very similar. You should be able to bend the butter without it breaking THIS IS SO SO SO SO SO IMPORTANT. If it breaks, it means it is too cold so let it come back to room temperature a little. Keep in mind that you don’t want it too soft or it will mix with the dough.

The dough should be twice as long as the butter so that it can wrap all the way around it.

Give the dough a quarter of a turn (one way or the other) and start rolling it out gently but surely. You may use my rolling pin rings to get to an even and perfect thickness all along (about 6mm not less).

Fold the top and fold the bottom to meet the first fold. Do not make the folds meet in the middle.

Then fold everything one more time in half.

We get four fold, or what we usually call a double turn. At this point, the dough needs to rest and the butter needs to regain firmness. It is possible to do the single turn right away, I sometimes do it. But it is usually recommended to put it back in the fridge for 30mns to 1 hour (or even longer).

Spread out the dough again making sure that it is facing you as if you were ready to open a book. Spread it out to about 6mm or a bit thicker but certainly no less than that.

This time we will give it a single turn, which means you need to fold the dough to create three layers (instead of 4 in the double turn above). Fold the top part.

Fold the bottom part over it, make any adjustment necessary.

Now we have given all the folding necessary. You may also do three single turns instead with resting time in between each turn. At this point, let it rest in the fridge for one hour.

Roll out the dough to 3 to 4mm thick. This time it does not matter which way you roll out the dough but aim for a rectangle that it 25cm tall (the height of the triangle) and 30 cm large (10cm base for each triangle). Mark the dough every 10cm at the bottom and every 10cm at the top starting at 5cm.

Now cut triangles joining the marks. Depending on the thickness of your dough you may end up with 6 croissants instead of five. Mine was a bit thicker than I would have wanted here.

Roll the croissants starting at the base without making them too tight it’s important! If too tight they will tear as they won’t have room to develop during the proofing stage. Let them proof 2 hours in an oven turned off with a bowl of hot water (for the steam) and a thermometer to control the temperature: ideally between 25°C to 26°C, definitely no more than 27°C after which the butter will start melting (and yes you guessed it bye bye fluffy layers).

Pre heat the oven to 450F. Egg wash the croissants with an egg mixed with 1 tbsp of heavy cream. Place them in the oven and set the oven down to 350F right away. Bake for 25 minutes (or more) but surely no less than 20 minutes. When they are done, set them on a cooling rack right away so the steam can escape. You may brush them with a syrup to make them shine (equal amounts of water and sugar) and let them cool before admiring the honeycomb structure.

HELP:

• So much can be said about the butter to use. One of my favorites is the beurre d’isigny (French of course)
• So much can also be said about flour, no matter what you will need to use a strong flour (aka bread flour), we need its gluten content to give the dough strength (more on that right below).
• If your coirssants leak butter in the oven it is either from a bad lamination or an under proofed product.
• If your croissant rise nicely during the first 10 minutes but then flatten moat likely your croissants are overproofed. Croissants are like a balloon in which we blow air. The balloon is the dough, its elasticity given by the gluten and the air comes from the yeast which release gas during proofing and until it reaches 40 degree Celsius temperature at which it is destroyed. If the balloon is not strong enough it will pop (read flatten), if too much air is blown in the balloon it will also pop. Could also be a combination of a weak balloon and too much air.
• THE shape! That’s also what could make your croissant not hold. Their structure just isn’t right and there is no way it could hold (despite a strong balloon and the right amount of air. During proofing each ‘roll’ will proof into the other giving it support. If your have only 3 spread apart roll your croissant won’t hold no matter what. Aim for at least 4 rolls.
• Fridge/freezer play: no matter what, you will not let your dough proof before the proofing stage. This means you need to keep your dough cool so the yeast doesn’t activate. This is not just to preserve the layers. It is also to keep the yeast hungry until it’s dinner time (proofing stage) where you will want it to give you as much air as possible. To help keep the dough cool, you need to work relatively fast of course but also return the dough to the freezer for 5 minutes or so before putting it back in the fridge for longer if needed. The freezer will cool the dough down faster meaning less time for the yeast to start proofing.
• The thickness of your dough before shaping matters! The thicker it is, the more visible the layers are and the more obvious the layers will be on the outside after baking (not necessarily a good thing), anything about 5mm thick won’t look too nice in my opinion (but you’ll get a nice picture of the raw croissant hehe). 3mm is ideal, during proofing and baking everything will melt into each other to give it a smoother finish to the eye but still with layers.

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