Rosie Tries Her Hand At Croissants.

Yesterday, I started on croissant dough. The recipe came from Baking With Julia, written by Dorie Greenspan. Contrary to popular belief, the croissant was not invented by the French, those cheese-eating surrender monkeys, who claim culinary superiority over the universe. Le croissant was created in Vienna, Austria, - the city of canals - in 1686, by a courageous baker during the time the city was being attacked by the Turks. The baker, working late one night, heard a rumbling noise and alerted the military leaders in Vienna. It was discovered that the Turks were trying to get into the city by tunneling under walls of the city. The tunnel was destroyed and the baker became a hero. All he wanted for his reward was the right to create a commemorative pastry. He made the pastry in the shape of a crescent, mirroring the crescent on the Ottoman flag.

My mise en place: 1 ounce compressed (fresh) yeast 3 3/4 cups unbleached all purpose flour 1/3 cup sugar 2 teaspoons salt 1 cup whole milk Except NOT.

I have no access to compressed fresh yeast. So I substituted packets of active dry yeast. I had no whole milk. So I substituted heavy cream. I had no unbleached flour. So I substituted bleached flour. All in all, I kinda Semi-Ho'd this recipe, since Sandra always says, "Use whatever you have."

I got to use my Christmas scales for the first time to measure out 1 ounce of yeast, which turned out to be 4 of those little packages of yeast, which I think is a whole lotta yeast.

I put the yeast, flour, sugar, salt, and one cup cream into my KitchenAid fitted with the dough hook.

I mixed for about 2 minutes on low speed, until a soft, moist dough formed on the hook. If you need to, add more milk, one tablespoon at a time. Next, I set the mixer to to its highest speed and worked the dough until it was smooth, elastic, and no longer sticky. About 4 minutes.

I removed the dough, wrapped it in plastic, put it in a plastic bag, left it at room temperature for 30 minutes to give the gluten time to relax, then refrigerated it overnight. Fast forward to this morning. Next, the buttah.

4 1/2 sticks of cold, unsalted butter cut into 1/2-inch cubes 2 TB unbleached all-purpose flour (Again, I have no unbleached flour.)

I beat the butter and flour on the highest speed, using the paddle attachment, until smooth - about 2 minutes.

I scraped the butter onto a large piece of plastic wrap and molded it into an oval 5-6 inches long and 1 inch thick. Refrigerate the butter while you work with the dough.

I placed the dough on a generously floured work surface My cold granite counter tops are perfect for this.

And rolled it out into an oval approximately 17 inches long and 10 inches wide.

Centered the butter oval on top.

And folded the top and bottom of the dough over the butter to make a tidy package.

I pressed the edges to make a neatly sealed rectangle. Using a rolling pin, I struck the dough to distribute the butter evenly, hence my very own whack-a-dough. Take THAT, Sandra Lee! After pounding, you should have a 1-inch thick rectangle about 14 inches long and 6 inches wide.

Keeping your work surface and the dough well-floured, roll out the dough into a rectangle 24-26 inches long and 14 inches wide.

Working from the left and right sides, fold the dough in thirds, so that you have a package that's 8 inches wide by 14 inches long. Transfer to a parchment lined baking sheet, cover the dough with plastic, and refrigerate for 2 hours. The dough needs two more turns. For the second turn, place the dough so the 14 inch side runs left to right. (You've given the dough a quarter turn.) Keeping your work surface well floured, roll the dough as before into a rectangle 24-26 inches long by 14 inches wide. Again fold the dough in thirds, wrap in plastic, and refrigerate for 2 hours. For the third turn, again start with the 14 inch side running from left to right. Roll into a rectangle 24-26 inches long by 14 inches wide.

Now, instead of folding into thirds, as I did the two previous times, I folded the left and right sides of the dough into the center, leaving a little space in the center. Then I folded one side over the other, as though closing a book.

According to the directions, "This is the famous double turn, also known as 'the wallet.' " Heh ... I'm sure all you TWoPer's out there will get a kick out of that.

And here's my "wallet."

After refrigerating the dough for another 2 hours, I positioned my "wallet" with the spine on the left and the opening on the right. I cut it in half, and froze one half and used the other for my croissants.

Keeping the surface and the dough well- floured, I rolled it into a rectangle 20 - 24 inches long and 15 - 18 inches wide.

Next, I cut it into rectangles.

And more rectangles. Save the scraps since you will use these when you roll up the croissant.

To shape the croissants, I rolled the triangles out until they were twice their original length. Then I used a little of the scrap dough, molded it into a football shape, and centered it on the wide top part of the triangle.

Then I simply rolled the dough towards me.

I turned the ends down and in toward the center to produce the classic crescent shape.

Set on a parchment lined baking sheet.

Brush with an egg wash - one large egg mixed with one tablespoon of water. Let rise in warm place for 3-4 hours until tripled in size.

Now, after all this work, this is where I screwed up. Whenever you're making a pastry with all the layers of butter and dough, it is essential to maintain the integrity of your butter and dough. Sadly, I did not. I slightly warmed my oven before putting in my croissants to rise. Apparently, my oven was too warm.

Damn it. The butter melted out. I knew I'd screwed up when I saw that. I went ahead, brushed the egg glaze on again and baked.

350 for 16 - 18 minutes until nicely bronzed. And here are my pitiful, deflated croissants. My bad. Cool on racks. Croissants should not be eaten as soon as they come out of the oven. The dough and layers need time to rest. Not to worry though. I have the other half of dough in my fridge and will make another batch, perhaps tomorrow. I also wanted to try the Almond Filled Croissant recipe, which, luckily, I forgot to try on this batch. Again, perhaps tomorrow. So, I give you my crappy croissants. The taste was buttery and yeasty, and the texture light and flaky. And these were the crapped-up croissants.

I can't wait until I make these properly.