#thepastryadventure January 2017 : The Croissant
So here it is...the first challenge! January - The Croissant!
Country of orgin : Austria / France
With everything, taste is the most important. Although, I think the texture of this particular pastry, comes first. The texture of the croissant, is layers of flakey, buttery goodness! This is achieved by quickly working the cold butter into the pastry and keeping the pastry cold!
Is the infamous croissant – French or Austrian?
So after research, to paraphrase :
1. Earliest story of the croissant dates all the way back to 1683 Vienna, Austria. The event takes place during the Ottoman Turk invasion of the city; a baker heard the Turks tunneling under the walls of the city, early one morning, as he lit his ovens to bake bread. He quickly sounded an alarm, and the military collapsed the tunnel, saving the city. To celebrate, the baker baked a crescent-shaped bread, in the shape of the crescent moon of the Turkish flag. A similar tale sets nearly the same course of events in Budapest, Hungary.
2. How did it become French? Legend has it that Marie Antoinette (Austrian born, mind you), came to France when she was 15. She missed the Austrian pastry, "kipfel" (German for crescent), that she asked bakers to attempt a version. However, this can be disputed because the first mention of the croissant in French is in Anselme Payen’s 1853 Des Substances alimentaires - published nearly a century after Marie-Antoinette’s reign.
3. Then there is the story of August Zang, an Austrian officer who founded a Viennese Bakery in Paris in 1839. It is believed that he is the most likely one to have introduced the kipfel to France, a pastry that later sparked the creativity of the French bakers to create a crescent of their own.
So, who first created the croissant? Not even history can tell :)
Definately, a pastry to practise!
Tries : 2 Will I ever make it again? : Yes...but not soon :)
1 down. 11 to go! :) Thanks for tuning in!
