For me, there is just one way to eat a croissant: Lukewarm with some nutella. But when I buy croissants in the bakery, they are cold. Of course I can place them shortly in the oven, but that is not the same. But there is a solution: Bake croissants by myself.

The last time I bake croissants I was not satisfied, because the croissants were not so fluffy like they should be. So it was time to try another recipe.

I decided to try a recipe that use pâte fermentée. It needs a lot of time, but most of the time is fermenting time in the fridge, so it does not matter to me.

To get fresh baked croissants on sunday morning, I started thursday night the pâte fermentée, friday night I prepared the dough, sunday i did the roll-in of the butter and formed the croissants. On Sunday morning I just take out the baking tray and placed the croissants in the oven. After all, it was not much work on each day, it just needed a lot of time!

But the outcome was perfekt: fluffy, layered, buttery taste … thats how croissants have to be!

Croissants mit Pâte fermentée

yields 12 Croissants

Pâte fermentée:

• 125 g flour (Type 550)
• 85g water
• 1g yeast
• 2 g salt

Dough:

• whole Pâte fermentée
• 500g flour (Type 550)
• 145g milk
• 165g water
• 25g butter
• 15g yeast
• 10g salt
• 80g sugar

Roll-in:

• 225g butter

Mix all ingredients for the pâte fermentée and ferment it for 1 hour at room temperature. Then put the dough into the fridge for  at least 12 hours.

For the dough mix alle incredients aside the sugar and kneat them with the kitchen machine for 6 min at low speed.

Now ad the sugar in small portions and knead one minute before adding the next portion. Adding the sugar later helps to build up the gluten!

Put the dough into the fridge untill next morning.

Take out the cold butter and place it between two plastic foils. Then hit the butter with the rolling pin untill a plate has formed and the butter is softend.

Roll the dough to a square with an edge length of 30 cm x 45 cm and put the butterplate in the middle. Fold the doug over the butter and roll again.  Fold the dough in thirds (like a letter) and cool in the fridge for at least 45 min (better 1 hour).

Repeat the rolling, folding and cooling Steps for another two times.

After the last resting periode, roll the dough to an 40 cm x 45 cm rectangle

Cut the dough into 2 stripes of 20 cm x 45 cm and each strip into 6 triangle. Roll them up from the  small side.

Place them on a baking tray, cover it with clingfilm and place it in the fridge untill next morning.

Heat the oven to 225°C and place the tray directly out of the fridge in the oven. Bake for 15 min.