Many factors can affect the outcome of what is essentially a pâte feuilletée levée – a basic dough of flour, sugar, salt, butter,

 yeast and water used for very light, flaky, rich pastries.

Everything from the temperature of the room, whether you use warm milk vs. cold milk when dissolving the yeast, quality butter, even-cooking and the weather all play an equal part in the recipe.

No matter how they are shaped, the perfect finished product should use these ingredients to create a balance of crisp, soft, buttery, sweet, a cautious bit of salt (or salted butter) and cloud-soft texture, with enough elasticity for some resistance.

What do I mean by “shaped?” Did you ever notice that some croissants have straight ends or are folded into a crab like boxing stance, claws/gloves turned under ready to fight? French law says that the “straight” croissant (no curved ends) must contain a 50% butter to flour ratio. This fact has led some to misidentify the best by shape:  a ‘straight’ croissant (hey-yyy, that’s only butter, buy that!) from a curved croissant (ew-www, that’s margarine.) Not true. Go by the aroma. Butter has a distinctive smell of deeply toasted caramel (not burned), margarine doesn’t. Shape matters not.



Butter vs. margarine? Unfortunately, when the price of butter went through the roof, margarine was allowed to be substituted. Although the Ministry of Agriculture requires bakeries to put up signs in the windows designating "pur beurre" (made with butter) or “ordinaire " (made with margarine), less discriminating bakeries take full advantage of using lesser quality ingredients for the same or higher price. Those bakeries, if caught, will be punished as inspections are rigorous and fines high.

(I once told a client I’d take her to the bakeries that made croissants with only butter and she looked at me puzzled, “You mean, not all croissants are made with butter?” Ah, bah non!)

Even-cooking? If overcooked, they can become more like bread than pastry. If perfectly cooked they are more pastry than bread (yes ma’am!)  If undercooked, well…it might work for Ben and Jerry’s ice cream but undercooked croissant “dough” is not pleasant. The temperature of the oven must be consistent for even baking.

Weather? Soggy? No texture, no flake and all rubber band consistency? Too much humidity (especially rain) can ruin the perfect croissant making it limp and soggy. Note, it isn’t always the amount of butter, something could be wrong with the production or weather. 

Taste test: I conducted a taste test of four top St Germain des Pres area bakeries known for croissants, the tasting assisted by a master bread baker of 20+ years. For fairness, he does not make croissants.  Within 30 seconds, just by sight, smell, texture and taste, he narrowed down a winner.  All croissants were purchased within 5 minutes of each other and tasted within 15 minutes of purchase. Weather, overcast.

So, what is the best? Everyone has a different standard. Just ask someone where to find the best croissant (or baguette, bistro, coffee, macaron, etc.) in Paris and put on your seatbelt when the well-meaning but varied opinions fly. But, no matter the opinion, chewy, flaky, or straight ends or curves, croissants should never, ever be undercooked. The result is gummy and limp. If there is additionally no flavor, no aroma and no texture...yikes. Perhaps it was the weather, but 3 croissants were undercooked while one, was overcooked.

The results are in order from the best to the worst....something worth sinking your teeth into!

Eric Kayser – price, 1.05e, straight ends, center not cooked, salted butter, crunchy, flaky. Perfect texture and aroma.
Pierre Hermé – price, 1.50e, square shape, "puffed" like a blow fish, so airy and overcooked, it was more a bread than a pastry, yeasty, not enough butter, not flaky. A bread roll.
Poilâne – price, 1.00e, curved ends, butter ratio good, smell a bit burnt but could be from the wood-fired oven, not an even bake, one end was undercooked and the opposite end was well-done, soggy with too much elasticity.
Gerard Mulot – 1.10e, curved ends, flat, no air, undercooked, doughy, rubber band elasticity, no smell, chewy, no flavor.