662127 Sun Oct 25 13:45:50 -0700 2009 6 31 Home Cooking 0 5129711 I've made Nancy Silverton's croissant recipe (available on epicurious.com) many times without any problems. I'll admit that it's been a couple of years, but I really befuddled this time around. The only ingredient that was different is that instead of Plugra butter (not available at WF yesterday), I used Straus European butter. I think that butterfat % is higher than Plugra, and that may be the issue, but what's happening is that there were a lot of discreet pieces of butter visible through the dough (even at the end). When I was forming the croissants, they looked pretty raggedy. Then, they didn't rise as much during the final proofing. They're in the oven now, and of course the butter pieces are melting all over the parchment. Does anyone have experience with this butter? Was this the wrong choice? Could I have inadvertently done something else different that is causing this problem? Thanks. Sun Oct 25 13:45:50 -0700 2009 184560 jocelyng 1 5133434 The fat content of the butter won't make that much difference. Sounds like you didn't cream the butter enough, or chilled it too much after creaming. Mon Oct 26 19:59:47 -0700 2009 5129711 53530 Zeldog 2 5133522 Yup. This isn't a butterfat thing. I'm betting the butter block was too cold, so instead of the butter spreading when you rolled it, it split into tiny pieces. There's a happy medium between a butter block that's too soft so the butter is squishy, and one that's too cold, so you have to bear down too hard with the roller and the butter cleaves into pieces. This is presuming that you are making the croissants using the classic method of encasing the butter block between two layers of dough to begin the lamination. If the butter block isn't at that happy medium so it moves continously with the dough, your croissants won't form their characteristic "thousand layers" and consequently won't rise in the oven. Boo-hoo. Mon Oct 26 20:41:58 -0700 2009 5133434 18222 maria lorraine 3 5140805 Thank you both for the very helpful responses. It's just weird that I had this experience after making it a half dozen times, but good to know for the next time. My kids would say that I'm out of practice! Thu Oct 29 12:09:12 -0700 2009 5133522 184560 jocelyng 4 5141162 How were they after baking? Thu Oct 29 14:20:01 -0700 2009 5140805 18222 maria lorraine 5 5149673 A mess :-(. We ate some of them, but they were really dense, which I should have foreseen. I'll try again. Mon Nov 02 12:14:35 -0800 2009 5141162 184560 jocelyng 6 5151039 I was thinking that croissant bread pudding might have been your next-day dish. Mon Nov 02 20:21:16 -0800 2009 5149673 18222 maria lorraine