Learning Viennoiserie in French Pastry School

🥐Making Croissants in French Pastry School: Everything you need to know

My first week of pastry school in France was all about one thing: leavened laminated dough and classic French breads. We dove straight into the world of viennoiserie, which includes those buttery, flaky breakfast pastries we all know and love—croissants and pain au chocolat!

But before we even touched any dough, I had to take a moment to admire the state-of-the-art kitchen and equipment. Think massive deck ovens with rolling racks, fridges that double as blast freezers and proofers, and industrial mixers that could handle what felt like a hundred pounds of dough. I had never seen anything like it!

🧈 Let’s Talk Croissants (and Pain au Chocolat)

Our very first lesson? Croissants. And not just the classic crescent-shaped kind—we also made pain au chocolat, those elegant little rectangles filled with chocolate batons. It was equal parts intimidating and exciting.

The most fascinating part for me was learning how to laminate croissant dough—that magical process of layering butter between dough and folding it over and over to create those iconic flaky, honeycomb-like layers.

🌀 Key Tips for Laminating Croissant Dough

1. Temperature is everything.The butter and dough need to be soft enough to roll but firm enough not to melt or crack. If the butter is too soft, it seeps into the dough and ruins the layers. If it’s too cold, it breaks and cracks. This is where our blast chiller came in handy. A few minutes inside would temper the dough and butter perfectly for rolling.

2. Know your folds.We used two types of folds in class:

• Single Fold (Wallet Fold): Fold the dough into thirds like a letter—one third over the center, then the last third on top.

• Double Fold (Book Fold): Fold the dough in quarters by bringing each side toward the center, then folding the whole thing in half like a book. This creates more layers and is often used for richer pastries.

Each fold was followed by a chill period to keep the butter in check. Laminating dough is truly a balance between technique and temperature control.

⏲️ The Art of Proofing Croissants

After shaping our croissants and pain au chocolats, we moved on to proofing—a crucial step that lets the yeast do its thing and helps the dough rise beautifully before baking.

We actually cold-proofed our shaped pastries at 0°C overnight, which allowed the dough to rest without rising. A few hours before baking, we transferred them to a proofing chamber set to 26°C (about 79°F). After around 2.5 hours, they had doubled in size and were ready to hit the oven.

🏠 Can You Proof Croissants at Home?

Absolutely! If you don’t have a proofing chamber at home, here’s a great DIY trick:

• Turn the oven light on.

• Place a pot of boiling water on the bottom rack.

• Put your tray of shaped pastries on the middle rack. The combo of heat and steam creates a warm, moist environment—perfect for proofing croissants and other laminated pastries at home.

Just remember: proofing is delicate. Over-proof, and your dough might collapse. Under-proof, and it won’t be light and airy.

And that wraps up my first jam-packed week in French pastry school! We covered so much more—brioche, baguettes, and other artisan breads—but I’ll save those for another post.

If you’ve ever been curious about how croissants are made or you want to improve your own laminated dough baking at home, I hope this gave you a few tips (and maybe a little pastry inspiration). Stay tuned for more lessons, recipes, and stories from my time in pastry school in France!