Tender Bittersweet Chocolate Croissants

Combine the buttermilk, yeast, and sugar briefly in a large bowl. Add the bread flour and the salt and stir to form a dough. Knead the dough within the confines of the bowl for a few minutes, just until it is smooth. Let the dough rise, covered with a kitchen towel or plastic wrap, for 2 hours.

After the dough has risen, place the dough in the refrigerator for 2 hours or even as long as overnight. Overnight is preferred. The stint in the refrigerator is called retarding the dough, as it stops the rising of the dough for the time being. It helps to build the flavor of the dough.

Once the dough has retarded, roll the dough out into a large rectangle. The size doesn’t really matter, but 9 inches by 18 inches is a good size. Cream the butter in a stand mixer. Spread the butter over the right 2/3 of the dough. I’ve found this is most easily done with your hands. Fold the dough into thirds like a letter. Wrap the dough in plastic wrap and refrigerate for 1 hour. If ever the butter squeaks out while handling the dough just cover the opening with flour. Always flour the dough and the work surface throughly when working with it.

Roll the dough out into a large rectangle once again, and fold into thirds just like before. Wrap the dough in plastic wrap and refrigerate for 1 hour.

Roll the dough out into a large rectangle, and fold into thirds. Wrap the dough in plastic wrap and refrigerate for 1 hour.

Repeat the rolling and refrigerating process just like the previous two times.

Roll the dough out one more time, but this time fold the left half and the right half of the dough towards the center, with the edges one inch apart. Then fold the left half over the right half so the dough is in 4 layers. Refrigerate the dough for another 1/2 hour to 1 hour.

Roll out the dough into a large rectangle about 1/4 inch thick and 10 inches in width. The length will probably be about 18 inches, but the important thing is that you can, with a bench cutter, cut fifteen 3 1/2 inch rectangles. I got 12 out of a perfect rectangle I made with my bench scraper, and 3 with the scraps I cut off to make the rectangle.

Take a square of dough and, using a rolling pin, roll the dough up and down a few times to make a rectangle with the short side towards you. Place a square of chocolate (Ghirardelli bars have 8 squares per bar, so one is leftover) in the center of the dough with one edge of the chocolate square up against the top edge of the rectangle, furthest way from you. Roll the dough around the square (it should cover the square once with a little bit to spare) and seal the edge around the chocolate. I do this by pressing the wrapped chocolate towards the counter when I get a centimeter of dough to spare and rotating the top of the square of chocolate around towards me as if rolling it again, while pressing the bottom down and away from me. This sounds really complicated, but it’s not. It just smears the dough onto itself. Place the chocolate-filled square of dough on one of 2 baking sheets covered with parchment paper. Repeat with the remaining squares of dough.

Let the croissants rise, covered with kitchen towels, plastic wrap, or paper towels, for about 1 hour, or until they are puffy.

Preheat the oven to 400ºF. Just before the oven is hot enough, combine the egg and milk in a small bowl and brush the egg wash to cover the top of each croissant completely. Place the pans in the oven on two different racks and bake for 7 minutes. After 7 minutes switch the position of the pans (the top one goes to the bottom and vice versa) and bake for another 7 minutes, or until the croissants have browned. They can be eaten hot or cooled. Enjoy!