← Nouns Cooking · Bakery

Ingredients

• 500 g strong white bread flour, plus extra for dusting
• 50 g caster sugar
• 2 tsp fine salt (10 g)
• 2¼ tsp fast-action dried yeast (one 7 g sachet)
• 280 ml whole milk, lukewarm
• 25 g unsalted butter, soft
• 250 g unsalted butter (82% fat), cold
• 200 g dark chocolate batons (24), or a bar cut into thin sticks
• 1 egg, beaten with a pinch of salt, to glaze

Method

1. Mix the flour, sugar, salt and yeast, add the milk and soft butter and knead for 5 min into a smooth dough. Flatten into a rectangle, wrap and chill for 1 hour.
2. Roll the cold butter between baking paper into a 17 cm square and chill until cold but pliable. Roll the dough to 35 × 18 cm, lay the butter on one half, fold over and seal the edges.
3. Roll into a 50 × 20 cm strip, fold in three like a letter, wrap and chill for 30 min. Repeat twice more, turning the dough a quarter each time.
4. Roll the dough to a 4 mm thick rectangle about 30 × 64 cm and trim the edges. Cut into 12 rectangles, roughly 10 × 16 cm.
5. Lay a chocolate baton across the short end of each rectangle, fold the pastry over it, add a second baton and roll up so the seam ends underneath. Set on lined trays, spaced well apart.
6. Glaze and leave to prove somewhere warm but not hot (24–26°C) for about 2 hours, until puffy and doubled; you should see the layers.
7. Heat the oven to 200°C (180°C fan, 400°F). Glaze again and bake for 15–20 min until deep golden brown. Cool for 10 min; the chocolate is molten-hot inside.

Tips

• Use good chocolate with 50–60% cocoa solids; very dark chocolate can taste bitter once baked.
• Shaped pastries can prove slowly overnight in the fridge for fresh pastries at breakfast.

Sources

Written in our own words after cross-checking these recipes:

BBC Good Food King Arthur Baking