Croissant

-

Since my previous post was about laminated yeasted products we made in our patisserie class, I thought this post should be about the world’s most popular laminated yeasted product: the Croissant. The croissant is a buttery and flaky bread roll with a unique shape which is described by some as a ‘crescent moon’ and by some as a ‘crab’.
An earlier variant of the croissant, the ‘Kipferl’, developed around the 13th century in Austria.  The story goes that in 1683, the Ottoman Turks invaded Vienna, Austria. They lay seize outside the city for a few weeks and then decided to get inside the city by digging a tunnel underground. They started digging the tunnel around night time and continued till before dawn. It is said that the Viennese bakers were the only ones awake at such unearthly hours of the morning as they were preparing breads for the next morning. The bakers heard the Turks digging under the city and alerted the military. The Viennese military collapsed the tunnel and defeated the Turks. The bakers were honoured for their service to Vienna and were requested to create a bread to celebrate this victory. The bread they made was named ‘Croissant’ to symbolize the Islamic crescent moon on the Turkish flag, so that every time this bread is consumed it shows the defeat of the Turks by the Viennese.
Some even say that the very controversial Austrian princess Marie Antoinette (“Let them eat cake”), who got married to French king Louis XVI in the 18th century brought the recipe of the croissant with her and popularised it in French. It became so popular that the French call it their own today and no French bakery can operate without having the croissant on its display case.
Whatever the story may be and no matter who actually came up with this bread, it is one of the most popular breakfast breads across the world. Many variations of the croissant have been made over the years. ‘Pain au Chocolat’, ‘Almond Croissant’ and ‘Cheese Croissant’ are the most popular variants.
Some people are under the impression that croissant rolling is impossible to do if you haven’t trained in French patisserie all your life. While croissant rolling isn’t the easiest activity to do, it isn’t such a nightmare. The following diagram I have made should help you understand how to roll a croissant.


Let me know if this was of any help and if you would like further guidance regarding making croissants.

Comments

Post a Comment

Type your comment here

Popular posts from this blog

Little Princesses

-
Image
I have to attribute my absence to my internship at Flurys. It is a six week internship that is part of my curriculum and I am exactly midway at three weeks. Confectionery has always been the dream so I opted to train at a stand-alone bakery and confectionery. In the city of Kolkata what better confectionery to train with than Flurys?  I have learned a lot in these three weeks alone and no doubt will continue to learn much more by the time this internship concludes. Numerous speciality cake orders are placed at Flurys every single day. Birthday cakes uncountable with the occasional anniversary and wedding. Children's birthday cakes are ordered by their parents everyday and the little girl inside me feels a sense of satisfaction every time I see a finished birthday cake before the birthday girl. A pattern I have been noticing is that parents of girls below 5 years of age choose to get princess themed cakes made for their daughters with dominant shades of pinks and pur
Read more

Peter Gilmore's Eight Texture Cake: Day 1

-
Image
Peter Gilmore's Eight Texture Cake Had an extremely tiring morning in the Patisserie Practical Class today. Well for obvious reasons. Considering my classmate Sukanya and I took up the task of recreating Peter Gilmore's Eight Texture Cake. Yes. That dreadfully complicated and sort of dramatic dessert we all saw on Master Chef Australia. Let's just say it is not that easy to keep your head when you have to make eight different and complicated desserts elements in less than 5 hours. We had to make a Cake Base, Chocolate Mousse, Chocolate Hazelnut Dacquoise, Chocolate Caramel Vanilla Ganache, Chocolate Caramel Cream Milk Chocolate Praline Disc, Dark Chocolate Disc and Hot Chocolate Sauce.  Well we slogged, panicked, rushed and almost gave up, but with a lot of help from all our other classmates and by the strength of our wills we got through the preparation day. We did not finish all 8 elements, but the 6 most time consuming ones are done. Both the chocolate di
Read more

Popsicles are Forever

-
Image
Do colourful, icy popsicles take you back to sticky, hot, summer afternoons of your childhood? If it does, this post is bound to take you down memory lane to the good ol' days of happiness, innocence and ignorant bliss! Even if popsicles don't ring a nostalgic bell in your mind, this post is bound to pull at all the right cords in your sugar-addicted soul. Before we fall into a nostalgic coma, lets talk about what popsicles actually are.   A  popsicle , ice candy ,   ice lolly ,   ice cream stick ,  freeze pop ,   ice block ,   icy pole ,  chihiro  or  ice pop  is a water-based frozen dessert. It is made by freezing flavored liquid, such as fruit juice  around a stick. Artificial food colouring and flavouring substances are very commonly used to give the brightness and sweetness so reminiscent of popsicles. Growing up in an all-girls' school in Kolkata, popsicles were known as ice cream sticks (EVEN when they were non-dairy ice lollies) and the absolute trademark
Read more