Tips, Theory, Technique, and other T-Words: LAYOVER AT LAMINATION STATION

I'll admit it. The first day of Breads and Pastry class at the New England Culinary Institute, Chef David Belo (a starched, bespeckled, close cropped young fellow whom you would never peg for being a former "problem student" at that same school) explained that one of our stations during that four-week stint would be the Lamination Station, I had no clue what he was talking about. I had visions of forcing a a pieces of dough between plastic and hot rollers, and besides, what the heck would I need to know all of this pastry nonsense for? I was going to work for food magazines.

Well, that was then. Now, I realize that a nice laminated dough can not only produce superior pastries, but creating superior pastries is much more satisfying than tagging along in a pastry shop, admiring the work others are doing, and getting paid merely to describe someone else's hard-earned technique. Believe me, I've done plenty of both.

SO ANYWAY, a laminated dough is one that has been filled with butter, and folded a number of times to create a dough that is made up of many layers of dough and butter. It's much easier to talk about this with pictures, so here we go.

1. Before the lamination begins, the dough is mixed, fermented for two hours, punched, and put in the cooler overnight to relax. It's a very loose mix - you don't want to build strength into the dough at this point because of all the rolling and folding it will go through. If the dough is very tight - or "bucky," as we call it - all that rolling would be quite a workout. Here it is, after coming out of the cooler:

2. That lump of butter (the one on the intro page) is patted out into nice flat discs and cooled. The softening and cooling of the butter (called the "beurrage" in the French tradition) is important for a couple of reasons: A) You want the butter nice and pliable so when it's rolled into the dough, it doesn't crack, and B) It's imperative that the butter and the dough (called the "detrempe" in the French tradition) are a similar temperature, so the butter doesn't melt, or at the other end of the thermometer, seize up and, again, crack.

3. When all is cool and ready, the dough is ceremoniously dumped onto the sheeter - this is the conveyor belt/rolling pin that allows large quantities of croissants to be made without employee mutiny. The butter is then patted into even thinner sheets, and laid onto half of the dough. The non-buttered side is then folded on top of the buttered side, and the edges are sealed.

4. We're going to start keeping count of layers now. The layering above goes Dough - Butter - Dough. Jackie's going to roll it out with the rolling pin now, to thin it out before it passes through the sheeter. After it's stretched out to her liking, she'll give it a three-fold by folding the right third of the dough into the middle third, and then folding the left third into the middle third, on top of the right third. She's very careful to brush all the flour off each folded surface, as excess flour can create dry spots in the layers and mess up the lamination. (also note the nice burn on Jackie's left arm - the long, red scars on baker's arms are usually sheet pan burns. J's got a nice collection.)

5. Now we have: Dough - Butter - Dough - Dough - Butter - Dough - Dough - Butter - Dough. Lovely. After a 45 minute rest to let that folded dough relax, it's time for the first "turn," when the dough is rotated 90 degrees (so that the seam of the bread is now down towards the bakers belly, rather than off to one side). It's passed through the sheeter again to a pre-determined thickness, given another three-fold, and put away to relax.

Now we're at: Dough - Butter - Dough - Dough - Butter - Dough - Dough - Butter - Dough -Dough - Butter - Dough - Dough - Butter - Dough - Dough - Butter - Dough - Dough - Butter - Dough - Dough - Butter - Dough - Dough - Butter - Dough.

After another 45 minutes, the process is repeated again, and we've got a fully laminated dough at: Dough - Butter - Dough - Dough - Butter - Dough - Dough - Butter - Dough - Dough - Butter - Dough - Dough - Butter - Dough - Dough - Butter - Dough - Dough - Butter - Dough - Dough - Butter - Dough - Dough - Butter - Dough - Dough - Butter - Dough - Dough - Butter - Dough - Dough - Butter - Dough - Dough - Butter - Dough - Dough - Butter - Dough - Dough - Butter - Dough - Dough - Butter - Dough - Dough - Butter - Dough - Dough - Butter - Dough - Dough - Butter - Dough - Dough - Butter - Dough - Dough - Butter - Dough - Dough - Butter - Dough - Dough - Butter - Dough - Dough - Butter - Dough - Dough - Butter - Dough - Dough - Butter - Dough - Dough - Butter - Dough.

So there you go. The fully laminated dough, ready to be rolled and cut into croissants, sticky buns, or Pigs in a Blanket. What's great about a properly laminated dough is that you get TWO types of leavening - the yeast in the dough makes the croissants rise like a regular bread (that's right, a croissant is a bread, not a pastry!), but then it gets the added bonus of "steam leavening" - the water in the butter layer evaporates into steam, separating each layer of Dough - Butter - Dough, resulting in extra flaky goodness! The pictures below display the benefits of a good lamination on the outside of a croissant, and the inside.