Homemade Croissants
Lately, I have been super into Sur la Table‘s cooking classes. I love going to them because 1. I get to eat and 2. I don’t have to do the dishes. Since I am marrying a frenchman, I obviously needed to learn how to make some authentic French food. So I decided to start with something I thought would be easy: croissants. I could not have been more wrong. They were the most time consuming and difficult thing I have ever baked. But so, so worth it!
We made traditional croissants, pain au chocolat, and ham and cheese croissants. It takes a really long time to make the dough (I’m talking like 2-3 hours), so our instructor had to make it the night before and refrigerated. There is a lot of measuring, cutting, and rolling involved when making croissants, so you have be really precise (which I’m not). You also can’t handle the dough for too long, otherwise the layers of butter that have been folded in will start to melt (learned this the hard way).
After you cut into perfect triangles, you cut a little slit in the widest part and pull apart the dough for about half an inch. It should look like an upside down Eiffel Tower (only fitting). And then you roll the dough into a perfect crescent.
They were seriously so yummy straight from the oven. I wanted my own tray. Literally drooling at my desk right now…My fiancé and I made these on our own a few weeks later and they turned out even better! But we decided that homemade croissants will only be made for special events. They just take way too long to make, but if you have the time they sure are worth it. The next time I make croissants, I’m going to attempt to make pretzel croissants. There is an amazing bakery in Dallas called Village Baking Company that makes them and they sell out EVERY DAY. So if I can master the pretzel croissant, I’ll be golden. I’ll keep you posted if they are a success!
Thanks so much for a fun cooking class, Sur la Table!
If you don’t have time to make your own croissants from scratch, try the Williams Sonoma Croissant Dough. You can buy them in large and mini versions, but they are only available certain times throughout the year. So keep checking! Honestly, you could totally pass them off as homemade and no one would know. I won’t tell.
