The Pleasure of Touch in Homemade Pain Au Chocolat

The sense of touch is the most neglected in quarantine. Tactile pleasures ground humans to life and that is what makes cooking all the more enjoyable in this new world holding pattern.

I was wrist-deep in soft, powdery flour. My hands formed a well, where I dissolved yeast into milk and water. I slowly moved more of the flour into the center to incorporate the ingredients, adding 10 grams of salt and 60 grams of sugar at the end.

My fingers pressed into the wet, pliant dough, and I began to throw it against the counter to develop the gluten. This is one of the most enjoyable steps of making homemade pain au chocolat.

My next favorite step is preparing the block of butter. I placed the chilled fat on the counter and raised my wooden rolling pin. With each powerful bang of the pin, the butter flattened into a rectangular disc, and I folded it into the rolled-out dough that had already chilled overnight.

Into the laminated dough, two hours later, I added dark chocolate pieces, creating little wrapped mouthfuls of pain au chocolats to proof for two more hours.

Then, I watched the chocolate sizzle in the oven as the layers rose into golden domes.

There are few things more sensorially gratifying than preparing pain au chocolat in your kitchen, other than sinking your teeth into the dark melted chocolate and feeling the crunch of the buttery layers.

Magnifique.

Croissant Dough:

250 g flour (Cake flour)
250 g flour (All-Purpose flour)
10 g salt
20 g fresh yeast (or 5 g Instant yeast)
60 g sugar
50 g butter
160 ml water
100 ml milk

For the lamination:
225 g butter (flattened into a disc and folded into the rolled-out dough like a letter)

Preheat oven to 425 degrees Fahrenheit and then lower the temperature to 350 when you put the croissants in for around 18 minutes (depending on the oven)

Bon Appétit!

*Recipe from Le Cordon Bleu