The Fresh Loaf

A Community of Amateur Bakers and Artisan Bread Enthusiasts.

Croissant dough issues

Lunapequenita's picture
Lunapequenita

Croissant dough issues

Hello, 

I've very new to bread baking and just tried making croissants again after a long hiatus. I'm not expecting great results due to a number of factors, but had some questions for next time. First, my dough was quite wrinkly and the mixing took way longer than the recipe (below) indicated.  It said to mix the ingredients with the paddle at low speed for about a minute, then switch to the dough hook and mix on medium for about five minutes until the dough was only slightly sticky and smooth. Mine took much longer than that, although I did end up switching to low medium (about a 4 on the stand mixer). Does anyone know what might affect the mixing time and why my dough was wrinkly?

Also, my butter. I thought I got the butter to a good consistency for the block (I beat the pieces with the rolling pin until they formed a rectangle that seemed malleable), but I still ended up with little to no lamination and just big chunks of butter poking out of the dough. Was my butter too cold? Not pliable enough? 

Here's the recipe (from the Joe Pastry blog):

For the dough (détrempe):

22 ounces (about 4 1/3 cups) bread flour
2 teaspoons salt
2 tablespoons sugar
4 teaspoons instant yeast
14 ounces (1 3/4 cups) whole milk at room temperature
3 ounces (1/3 cup + 1 tablespoon) cream at room temperature

For the butter slab:

3 Tbsp flour
12 ounces cold Euro-style (cultured) butter

Any tips would be welcome. Thank you.

 

 

Baking Soul's picture
Baking Soul

Hello ,,

i guess maybe you need speed up your mixer  to medium fast.

Regarding the butter i don't understand why the flour for the slab. the texture of the butter should be smooth creamy.

if your butter has creamy smooth texture and holding together, maybe the chunk because you working the dough too much or working in high temperature.

my suggestion is not to use flour just shape the butter as an even rectangle or square, let it cool in the fridge.

i do my folding with butter and dough temperature around 16/18 c to make sure i get good layers.

 

Lunapequenita's picture
Lunapequenita

Thanks for your reply. The recipe said the flour was to keep the butter at the right consistency (I think to prevent it from getting warm and greasy). Do you think it caused an issue? It's possible I overworked the dough. 

Baking Soul's picture
Baking Soul

try to discard the flour ,,

in my humble opinion if the flour got mixed with the butter it will damage it's consistency.

if your room temperature above 20c you may want to pot your dough in the fridge for 10 minutes between each fold.

and the recipe that user dmg using is quite good. i'm not being bias but the best croissant recipes are the authentic french.

keep us updated with your process.

dmg's picture
dmg

This recipe is quite different from the one I use. It seems to be a much wetter dough which might explain the breakthrough. I have had excellent results with this one:

 

https://www.weekendbakery.com/posts/classic-french-croissant-recipe/

 

This has been consistently good right from my first attempt and I have been making a batch every 10 days or so for two years.