On Food #1: Homemade Croissants Made Me Learn How to Live in The Moment
The only homemade croissant recipe you should try.
Croissants are the type of food not many people bake at home, not because they’re not delicious but because you really have to work for it. I guess that’s how life was before bakeries existed, you had to work for it, something our modern society is slightly disassociated with (me included). So when I pop out to my local Gail’s (shout-out to their cinnamon buns), I buy convenience, the convenience of not having to let my butter soften at room temp just to simply shape it into a large thin square sheet and pop it into the fridge, I lost a good half hour and I haven’t even made the dough yet.
Croissants are a true labour… full stop. I was going to write … of love but it really is just labour and soooo many things can go wrong. If you don’t have the patience and the ability to see any shortcomings as a chance to learn, this is certainly not for you. I’ve always struggled to relate to those who love a challenge, I do prefer the easy road. However, this is where things get interesting. Making croissants was and still is (if I do it on a good day) the only way my brain will somewhat switch off.
This 24-hour journey (largely unattended) results in the best croissant I’ve ever tasted, and I didn’t even follow Claire Saffitz’s recipe (in the New York Times cooking section) to the T. There were ups and downs and I was incredibly close to throwing the whole thing away (remember when I said this task helped my brain switch off) when somehow, I kept going not because I believed in myself but because I had nothing to lose. Even if it was a failure, how bad can flour, sugar and butter taste? This tiny leap in faith rewarded me with the tastiest pastries and I learnt that there was something to be savoured if I let go of my phone for more than a few hours to concentrate on something other than a screen.
Yes, you might be wondering whether I solely bake pastries when I need a break from social media and that’s a fair thing to ask, the answer is no, I’ve only made them once which takes me to my first point. They’re still tedious and they require dirtying the kitchen counter with so much flour that sometimes I don’t have the mental capacity, now that I know what it takes. Maybe this is the conundrum we all live our lives with, we know something is good for us but we can’t bring ourselves to do it, no matter how good you know that is.
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The only homemade croissant recipe you should try: Croissants By Claire Saffitz