I love a nice buttery croissant and yesterday I decided to make some, but to fill them with some prosciutto and some gruyere cheese to make a lovely savoury snack for lunch.
Croissants take some time to make, particularly if you rest the dough overnight as I did. But all the effort is worth while when you get to eat them warm from the oven.
Although I used Gruyere I think any hard cheese would be ok, though gruyere does melt very well. The same with the prosciutto, I think some thinly sliced ham would work well too.
I am very pleased with how mine turned out, they were very tasty indeed, as I said they were ideal for lunch.
Prosciutto & Gruyere Croissants
Prosciutto & Gruyere Croissants – Video
Ingredients:
- 250g strong white bread flour
- 5g salt, plus a pinch for the egg wash
- 5g instant(easy bake yeast)
- 150ml cool water
- 150g chilled butter
- 1 medium egg, to glaze the croissants before baking
- 100g gruyere cut into about 36 batons
- 6 slices of prosciutto
Method:
- Put the flour into a bowl of a mixer fitted with a dough hook. Add the salt and sugar to one side of the bowl and the yeast to the other side.
- Add the water and mix on a slow speed for 2 minutes, then on a medium speed for 6 minutes. The dough should be fairly stiff.
- Tip the dough out onto a lightly floured surface and shape it into a ball. Dust with flour, put into a clean plastic bag and chill in the fridge for an hour.
- On a lightly floured surface, roll out your dough to a rectangle, about 60 x 10cm(12x4in); it should be about 1cm thick.
- Flatten the butter to a rectangle, about 20 x 9.5cm(8×3.75 in), by bashing it with a rolling pin. Put the butter on the dough so that it covers the bottom two-thirds of the dough. Make sure that it is positioned neatly and comes almost to the edges.
- Fold the exposed dough at the top down over one-third of the butter.
- Now gently cut off the exposed bit of butter, without going through the dough, and put it on the top of the dough you have just folded down.
- Fold the remaining third of the dough up and onto the exposed butter. You will now have a sandwich of two layers of butter and three of dough.
- Pinch the edges lightly to seal in the butter.
- Put the dough back in the plastic bag and chill in the fridge for an hour to harden the butter.
- Take the dough out of the bag and put it on the lightly floured work surface with one of the ‘open’ ends towards you.
- Roll into a rectangle, about 30 x 10cm, as before. This time fold up one-third of the dough and then fold the top third down on top to make a neat square to make a neat square.
- This is called a single turn. Put the dough back into the plastic bag and chill for another hour. Repeat this stage twice more, putting the dough back into the fridge for an hour between turns.
- After the third turn the dough needs to be left in the fridge for 8 hours, or overnight, to rest and rise slightly.
- When you are ready to shape the croissants, line 2 baking trays with baking parchment or silicone paper.
- Put the dough on a lightly floured surface and roll out to a rectangle, a little more than 42cm long and 18cm wide. Trim the edges to neaten them.
- Cut triangles along the length of each strip; these should be 12cm wide at the base and about 18cm high (from the middle of the base to the tip). Once you have cut the first triangle, you can use it as a template for the rest. You should get 6 triangles from each strip.
- Before rolling, hold down the wide base of the triangle and gently tug the opposite thin end to cause a slight tension in the dough.
- Make a nick in the wide end, about 1.5cm(3/4 inch).
- Place a slice of prosciutto onto the dough and then add up to 6 batons of gruyere, leaving a gap and also allowing the cheese to overlap the edges.
- Now starting at the wide end of the triangle, roll up into a croissant, with a gentle pushing outwards motion. You will have 6 medium-sized croissants.
- Put the croissants on the prepared baking trays, leaving space in between them to expand; allow 3 per tray.
- Put each tray inside a clean plastic bag, or cover with a clean tea towel and leave the croissants to rise at cool room temperature (18 – 24°C) until at least doubled in size. This should take about 2 hours.
- Heat your oven to 200C/180C Fan/400F
- Lightly whisk the egg with a pinch of salt to make an egg wash. Brush the top and sides of the croissants with the eggwash. Bake for 15 – 20 minutes or until golden brown. Cool on a wire rack. Eat warm.