Croissant
A crescent-shaped, buttery, flaky Viennoiserie pastry.
A croissant is a Viennoiserie in a crescent shape made from a laminated yeast dough that sits between a bread and a puff pastry. It is buttery and flaky, inspired by the shape of the Austrian kipferl, but using the Viennoiserie yeast-leavened laminated dough. Croissants are named for their crescent shape. The modern croissant was developed in the early 20th century, when French bakers replaced the brioche dough of the kipferl with a yeast-leavened laminated dough.
- type
- Viennoiserie pastry
- origin
- France (developed from Austrian kipferl)
- key_ingredients
- Laminated yeast dough, butter
- earliest_known_recipe
- 1905 (present-day croissant); 1906 (Colombié's Nouvelle Encyclopédie culinaire)
- associated_person
- August Zang (Austrian officer who opened Viennese bakery in Paris, 1838 or 1839)
- common_uses
- Breakfast, continental breakfast, fast food
Lore & Background
The kipferl, an Austrian crescent-shaped pastry, can be dated back to at least the 13th century in Austria. In either 1838 or 1839, an Austrian artillery officer, August Zang, founded a Viennese bakery at 92, rue de Richelieu in Paris, serving Viennese specialties including the kipferl. The French version was named for its crescent (croissant) shape. The earliest known recipe for the present-day croissant appears in 1905, though the name appears among 'fantasy or luxury breads' in 1853. Sylvain Claudius Goy's 1915 book La Cuisine Anglo-Americaine contains a croissant recipe using a laminated yeast dough known as pâte feuilletée levée.
Reader's Guide
The croissant's significance lies in its evolution from the Austrian kipferl into a distinct French Viennoiserie, achieved by replacing brioche dough with a yeast-leavened laminated dough in the early 20th century. Its development was accelerated by August Zang's Viennese bakery in Paris, which popularized the kipferl and inspired French imitators. By the late 1970s, factory-made frozen dough made croissants a fast food that could be baked by unskilled labor, with 30–40% of croissants sold in French bakeries in 2008 baked from frozen dough. The croissant is a common part of a continental breakfast in many European countries. Culinary legends, unsupported by contemporary sources, link its crescent shape to the defeat of the Umayyads at the Battle of Tours (732) or to the 1683 siege of Vienna, but these are not historically verified.
Did You Know?
- The croissant's dough is layered with butter, rolled and folded several times in a technique called laminating, resulting in a flaky texture similar to puff pastry.
- The earliest known recipe for the present-day croissant appears in 1905, though the name 'croissant' appears among 'fantasy or luxury breads' in 1853.
- In the late 1970s, factory-made frozen dough turned croissants into a fast food that could be freshly baked by unskilled labor.
- The Islamic State attempted to ban croissants during the Syrian civil war due to legends linking the shape to the defeat of Ottoman forces.
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