Breakfast Pastries - Day 2

Today's pace was much better and not nearly as hectic. We utilized the doughs that were made yesterday and stored overnight in the fridge and made brioche rolls and sticky buns. We laminated the danish dough and cut into portions that will be shaped and baked tomorrow. For those that don't know, laminating dough is the process of building many layers. For a half sheet pan we used 1# 12 oz. of butter. Take the butter and place it between two sheets of plastic wrap and then beat the butter into a nice rectangular block and place it in the fridge. Then roll out the chilled danish dough in a long rectangle. Place the chilled butter block at one end of the dough and then fold the non buttered end into the middle and fold the buttered end on top of that. Place the folded dough into the half sheet pan rolling it to fit the pan and place in the fridge for 30 minutes. After 30 minutes take the dough out of the fridge and out of the pan, turning the dough a quarter turn and roll it out a bit elongating the rectangle in order to perform the folds again. Place back into pan and back into fridge for another 30 minute rest. Then bring it back out for one final quarter turn, roll and fold. Place back into fridge for another rest and to let the dough become very chilled. When you take the dough out, you will roll it into a long thin rectangle (or you can use a sheeter if you have one available...highly unlikely for the typical home cook...so we're forced to roll roll roll). Once that is done you can cut your dough and shape it. I'll have pictures tomorrow of the finished danish as we ran out of time today. This same process will be used to make croissants. All those nice layers of dough and fat (butter) are what make them so deliciously flaky. We'll probably be making croissant dough tomorrow as well so in the coming days I should have some nice pics (hopefully) of some yummy croissants.

Laminating process for danish:

Brioche Rolls - (needed more eggwash for deeper shinier color)

Sticky Buns