Almond Croissant excerpted from Lune: Eating Croissants All Day, Every Day by Kate Reid. Photography by Pete Dillon.
The debut cookbook from Lune, a world-renowned croissant bakery in Australia. Lune Croissanterie is one of the most talked about bakeries in the world.
From rave reviews from Nigella Lawson, Yotam Ottolenghi, René Redzepi and Rachel Khoo, to features in news outlets such as New York Times and The Guardian, Lune has been touted as ‘the best croissant in the world’ since it opened its doors in 2012.
Customers are queuing quite literally around the block from the early hours to eat Lune’s pastries, but what makes this book so special is how Kate Reid elevates croissant pastry from a classic breakfast staple to a refined vehicle for breakfast, lunch and dinner.
With step-by-step techniques for rolling and shaping croissants, followed by recipes for every hour of the day, plus what to do with leftovers and how to make a croissant a special occasion, this is the ultimate guide to baking the world’s best-loved pastry.
Lune: Eating Croissants All Day, Every Day is available at Amazon.com, Amazon.co.uk and Indigo.ca.
Almond Croissant
At Lune, like everything else we do, almond croissants are not exactly made the traditional way. Classically, an almond croissant will be flat, and I hate to say it, often rather sad looking. The old-school way to make almond croissants is to bake them between two trays, such that they are squashed during their second bake.
This seemed like madness to me – why would you want to lose the definition of all those beautiful layers, and in the process, the crunch and flake of that buttery pastry? So, I developed a recipe and technique for the almond croissant that maintained the integrity of the structure of the croissant, while still incorporating the moist, delicious, cake-like frangipane through the centre.
The signature of a Lune almond croissant? The beautiful spine of flaked almonds that stand proud and perfect atop the croissant.
YIELDS 6
6-day-old croissants sugar syrup
Almond Frangipane (Essentials, see below)
flaked almonds
icing (powdered) sugar
SUGAR SYRUP
500 g (17 oz) water
220 g (73⁄4 oz) caster (superfine) sugar
2 tablespoons kirsch
- Place the water and sugar in a small saucepan and stir over a medium heat until all the sugar is dissolved, then bring the syrup to the boil. Once boiling, remove from the heat and add the kirsch.
ASSEMBLING AND BAKING
- Preheat your oven to 180°C fan (350°F) and line a large baking tray with baking paper.
- Using a large serrated knife (a bread knife will work best), cut the croissants in half. Brush the cut side of both halves of each croissant generously with the sugar syrup. Pipe a healthy wiggle of frangipane on the bottom half of each croissant then replace the top halves, cupping your hand and gently securing each top. Finish off each croissant by piping a seam of frangipane across the top, then garnish with flaked almonds, pinching as many almonds as you can together and pressing them into the frangipane, along the entire length of the seam. (How we get the flaked almonds to stand up so perfectly is one of the most frequently-asked questions at Lune. There is no magic answer. It is labour intensive, time consuming and difficult. Our chefs prepare literally hundreds of almond croissants at Lune every day, such is their popularity, hence practice makes perfect!)
- Place the prepared croissants on the lined baking tray and bake for 18–20 minutes, until the frangipane inside is set. Check this by carefully lifting the lid of one of the croissants with a fork and checking the doneness of the frangipane. If it still looks like cake batter, it is not yet ready. Bake for a few more minutes and check again.
- Remove from the oven and allow to cool to room temperature.
- Once cooled, dust the almond croissants with icing (powdered) sugar and serve.
ALMOND FRANGIPANE
200 g (7 oz) butter, at room temperature 200 g (7 oz) caster (superfine) sugar
grated zest of 1 orange
2 eggs
200 g (7 oz) natural almond meal
- Beat the butter, sugar and orange zest in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a flat beater until pale and fluffy.
- Add the eggs one at a time, continuing to beat and waiting until each one is incorporated fully before adding the next. Scrape down the bowl after incorporating the first egg.
- With the mixer on low speed, mix in the almond meal. Once again, scrape the bowl down well, giving it a final mix by hand (with a spatula) to ensure all the ingredients are well incorporated.
- Transfer the frangipane into a piping bag fitted with a size 11 star nozzle.
Recipe reprint with permission from Hardie Grant Books.