Croissants

A Pastry Born from Legend

The croissant may be the most French thing you can imagine — but it didn’t begin in France. Its story starts in Austria, centuries before it ever touched a Parisian table.

The ancestor of the croissant is the kipferl, a crescent-shaped bread roll that dates back to at least the 13th century in Vienna. Popular legend ties its shape to the defeat of the Ottoman Empire during the siege of Vienna in 1683 — the crescent echoing the Ottoman flag, baked as a symbol of victory.

The kipferl arrived in Paris in the 1830s, brought by Austrian baker August Zang, who opened a Viennese-style bakery that captivated the city. But the kipferl was still just a bread roll. The transformation into the croissant we know today came in 1915, when French baker Sylvain Claudius Goy published the first recipe combining laminated dough with yeast — folding cold butter into the dough again and again to create dozens of paper-thin layers. That technique turned a simple roll into something extraordinary.

Every croissant I make carries that same technique — unchanged in over a century. No shortcuts, no machines. Just flour, butter, patience, and the oldest method in pastry.

The Art of Lamination

The word “lamination” sounds technical, but the idea behind it is beautifully simple: fold butter into dough, again and again, until you’ve created dozens — sometimes hundreds — of alternating layers of dough and fat, each one thinner than a sheet of paper.

When the croissant hits the oven, something magical happens. The moisture in the butter turns to steam, and that steam pushes the layers apart from the inside. Each layer puffs up, separating from the next, creating the airy honeycomb structure that makes a great croissant feel almost weightless despite being rich with butter. The outside caramelizes into a golden, shattering crust. The inside stays soft, tender, and slightly elastic.

This is the mechanic behind the magic — and it only works when the lamination is done correctly. The butter has to stay cold. The dough has to stay relaxed. The folds have to be precise. If the butter melts into the dough during lamination, you don’t get layers — you get a brioche. If the dough tears, the butter leaks out in the oven. Every step matters, and there’s nowhere to hide a mistake.

That’s why most bakeries don’t make their own croissants anymore. They buy frozen, pre-laminated dough from factories and bake it on-site. It’s faster, cheaper, and consistent. But it’s not the same. A hand-laminated croissant is a different pastry entirely — and once you’ve had one, you’ll know the difference from the first bite.

A Croissant by the Numbers

Behind every golden, flaky croissant are numbers that tell the story of how much care goes into each one.

A Two-Day Journey

There’s a reason I don’t call this a recipe — it’s a rhythm. Making croissants by hand is a conversation between dough, butter, and time. Here’s what each batch goes through.

Handmade vs. Factory Croissants

Most croissants people eat today aren’t really made — they’re assembled. Frozen, pre-shaped dough arrives at the bakery in boxes, goes from freezer to oven, and comes out looking the part. The crust is golden. The shape is right. But the experience stops at the surface.

A factory croissant is made with margarine or shortening instead of real butter, because real butter is expensive and temperamental. The dough is mixed and laminated by machines that prioritize speed over precision. Dough conditioners, emulsifiers, and preservatives are added to ensure the product survives freezing, shipping, and storage. The result is a croissant that looks correct but tastes flat — dense, chewy, and forgettable.

A hand-laminated croissant made with real butter is a completely different experience. The crust doesn’t just look golden — it shatters. The inside isn’t just soft — it’s a honeycomb of airy, delicate layers that pull apart like pages of a book. The flavor is rich, buttery, and slightly sweet, with a complexity that comes from real fermentation and real ingredients.

You’ll never mistake one for the other once you’ve had both.

It All Comes Down to Butter

A croissant is, at its heart, a delivery system for butter. The dough exists to hold the layers. The lamination exists to multiply them. And the oven exists to turn solid butter into steam, air, and flavor. Everything in a croissant leads back to one ingredient — so the quality of that ingredient matters more here than in almost any other baked good.

I use high-fat European-style butter with at least 82% butterfat — compared to the standard 80% in most American butter. That extra 2% makes a noticeable difference. Higher butterfat means less water, which means crispier layers, cleaner flavor, and a richer mouthfeel. It also means the butter holds its structure better during lamination, which keeps the layers distinct and the final product lighter.

There are no substitutes in my croissants. No margarine, no shortening, no vegetable oil blends. Just real butter — because a croissant without real butter isn’t really a croissant.

My Croissant Menu

Every variety starts with the same hand-laminated dough and the same European-style butter. The only thing that changes is what goes inside — or on top.

How to Enjoy Your Croissant

A fresh croissant is best eaten the day it’s baked — ideally within a few hours of leaving the oven, when the crust is at its crispest and the layers are at their most delicate. No plate required. No utensils needed. Just pick it up and let it fall apart in your hands.

If you can’t eat them the same day, croissants freeze beautifully. Wrap them individually in foil and store in a freezer bag. When you’re ready, heat them straight from frozen in a 375°F oven for 8–10 minutes. They’ll crisp up and taste almost as good as fresh. Never microwave a croissant — it turns the flaky layers into something soft and chewy, which is the opposite of what you want.

Why I Make Croissants by Hand

I could buy frozen dough. It would be faster, easier, and far less stressful. But every time I fold butter into dough — every time I feel the layers building under my hands — I remember why I started baking in the first place.

A hand-laminated croissant is one of the most honest things a baker can make. There’s nowhere to hide. The layers tell the truth about every decision — how cold the butter was, how patient the process was, how much care went into each fold. When someone tears open one of my croissants and sees that honeycomb of light, airy layers inside, they’re seeing the work itself.

That’s what Einkorn Bakes is about. Not mass production. Not shortcuts. Just honest baking, made with real ingredients, shaped by hand, and offered to my neighbors with pride.