Chocolate Chroissants : Pain au Chocolat

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup (120ml) warm milk
• 1 3/4 cups (250g) strong bread flour
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 11 tablespoons (150g) butter, frozen
• 4 tablespoons (50g) sugar
• 2 tsp (7g /1 sachet) dry yeast
• Chocolate chips or bar
• 1 egg yolk beaten with 1 tbsp milk to glaze

Directions

1. Warm your milk until it is body-temperature (just warmed)
2. In a large bowl add the flour, salt, sugar and yeast and whisk to combine.
3. Grate the frozen butter straight into your flour. You want pea sized pieces of cold butter
4. Pour in the milk and gently combine to a dough using a spoon until the dough just comes together. You want the butter to remain in pea-sized pieces so don't be too enthusiastic when mixing the dough! don’t add liquid
5. Turn the dough out of a lightly floured work top and press together to form a square. It will be soft. Wrap in clingfilm and put in the fridge for 90 minutes
6. Lightly dust your worktop and rolling pin with flour.
7. Roll your dough out to a rectangle roughly 14 ½ inches by 10 inches
8. Fold the short sides of the dough into the middle
9. Rotate the dough by a quarter turn. Roll out slightly to lengthen. Fold the short ends towards the middle
10. Flip the dough over so the seams are underneath. Roll it out again repeating the folding steps 2 more times. The dough will become more elastic as you are rolling and folding it. If at any point the butter softens too much, cover and pop in the freezer to firm it before continuing with rolling and folding.
11. The dough should be formed into a smallish rectangle. Wrap it twice with cling film and put in the fridge for a couple of hours or, ideally, overnight.
12. Roll the dough out to a rectangle three times as long as it is wide and at least 4mm thick. Trim the edges with a pastry scraper.
13. Cut the dough into triangles about 30cm/12in long and 8cm/3in at the base. Cut a small slit in the centre of each triangle base.
14. Gently stretch the corners and tip, add your chocolate to the wide end then loosely roll the dough up. Place, tip side down, on a large tray lined with baking paper. Repeat with the rest of the dough, spacing the croissants a few inches apart on the tray.
15. Cover loosely with greased cling film and let the croissants rise for 2-3 hours at room temperature
16. Preheat the oven to 230C | 450F. Brush the croissants with the egg wash and bake for ten minutes then reduce temperature to 190C | 375F and bake for another 5 ish minutes or until the croissants are a deep golden brown. Cool on a wire rack before serving.