Croissants

Better than bought, simple but time consuming, but well worth the effort.

Paul Hollywood's croissant recipe

Ingredients

625 g strong bread flour
12 g salt
75 g sugar
20 g dried yeast
water, for mixing
500 g butter, chilled
1 egg, beaten

Method
1. Place the flour, salt, sugar and yeast in a large mixing bowl. Using a wooden spoon, slowly mix in a little water until the mixture forms into a pliable dough.

2. Place the dough on a floured surface and knead well until it feels elastic.

3. Return the dough to the bowl, cover and chill in the refrigerator for 1 hour.

4. Return the chilled dough to your floured work surface and roll it into a rectangular shape, around 60cm by 30cm.

5. Roll out the chilled butter into a rectangle about 1cm thick, around 20cm by 30cm.

6. Place the butter rectangle in the centre of the dough rectangle, so it covers around two thirds of the dough.

7. Fold the remaining dough third over the butter layer, so that the dough is now in 3 layers.

8. Return the dough to the refrigerator to chill for a further hour.

9. Scatter some more flour over your table and roll out the dough to a rectangular shape, around 60cm by 30 cm.

10. Repeat the folding process, then return the dough to the refrigerator for a further hour.

11. Repeat this process of folding and chilling two more times, then wrap the dough in cling film and set it aside to rest overnight.

12. Using a rolling pin, roll out the rested dough to 3mm thickness.

13. Cut the rolled out dough into squares, each square 20cm by 20cm.

14. Cut each square diagonally, making 2 triangles from each dough square.

15. Place the dough triangles on a lightly floured surface with the narrow point facing away from you, cut a slit approx 1.5 cm in middle of shortest side.

16. Roll each dough triangle up over itself and curl the dough roll around into a traditional crescent shape.

17. Place the shaped croissants on baking trays lined with silicone baking parchment and leave to rise for 1 hour, 30 minutes.

18. Preheat the oven to 200°C/gas 6.

19. Lightly egg-wash the croissants and bake for 10-15 minutes until golden brown.



This makes 20, I have frozen half the dough but I think I would half the recipe next time.
I may also try with half the amount of butter too.