French Pastry Lesson!

Let's just start this post with...I LOVE PASTRIES! My love for French pastries in particular started when I went to the Des Moines Farmer's Market with my friends. There is a pastry stand from Le Mie Bakery (business found in Des Moines) that has the best pain au chocolat (chocolate croissants). Of course Hattie chose that one to purchase and I chose a blueberry pastry the first time. When we went back I was sure to get the chocolate one. Hattie struck GOLD! Chocolate croissants are now my favorite :)

A couple weeks ago the Pastry Chef for NCBA/Beef Checkoff noticed my continued interest in what she does (make amazing desserts). She asked me, "Cassie, if there was one thing you would like me to teach you to do before you left...what would it be?!" I of course answered that I wanted a pain au chocolat lesson! That turned into us preparing various pastries for the morning meeting today! Later we hope to experiment with making beef fillings for these babies!

This process is a labor of love and the end result is well worth it. She wanted to show me how to make regular croissants and brioche-style croissants. Brioche incorporates eggs and more milk into the dough. It results in a more dense, bread-like texture whereas the other dough yields an airy and flaky texture. I prefer the regular croissants :)

 After we made the doughs and punched them down we were ready to go. Rolling out the first layer. There is a total of 3 folds involved with 30 minutes of chilling in between. This ensures that the butter stays good and cold and doesn't melt into the dough. The more the butter stays in tact...the flakier the result!

Adding the butter; it needs to be spreadable, but still cold. The key is to not warm it up too much with your hands. It's best to be quick with this! I rolled out the brioche "rich" dough while my buddy the Pastry Chef rolled out the croissants. She is a master :)

 Making the first fold; the technique is called a trifold. After you make the initial fold, you roll the butter in and fold it again. This starts the count of the three folds; we folded two more times after this. Kinda confusing...but you get the hang of it!

 Ready to be wrapped in Saran wrap and chilled! We labelled the dough with when we needed to take it out to make another fold and roll; also we put what type of dough it was.

After cutting off a piece of chilled dough, you roll it out and make shapes...and fill those shapes with various things. We made these fillings: blueberry-lemon, strawberry-lime, cream cheese, and CHOCOLATE! Also we made traditional croissants and mini cinnamon rolls!

Brushing all of the fruit-filled and cream cheese ones with an apricot jelly glaze...the chocolate ones got a drizzle and a light sprinkling of powdered sugar! I enjoyed a sampling of the different kinds...but my favorites were the cream cheese done with the brioche dough and the chocolate done with the traditional dough.



 Can you tell which one is the brioche dough? It is the one on the right!

All-in-all it was my dream come true! I will never forget this experience. I enjoyed every minute...and need to keep practicing! I'm sure I could find some people to sample my work :)