Ingredients
Ingredients for dough:
60g 100% hydration sourdough starter (50% wholemeal wheat flour, 50% wholemeal rye flour) straight from fridge.
385g Foricher T45 flour
30g unsalted butter warmed until soft to incorporate into dough
2 medium egg yolks
240g milk
60g of roasted pumpkin mashed until fairly smooth (or 10-15g sugar if not using pumpkin)
Ingredients for lamination:
165g unsalted butter cold
Torsten's Sourdough Pumpkin Croissants using a Dough Sheeter
Great customers don't grow on trees but this one actually grows them. Torsten Junker of family-run Cobhay Nurseries not at all far from us in Wellington grows the kind of trees literally fit for a king. He's also an accomplished home baker and has been trying out one of our Japan Kneader Dough Sheeters to make, Sourdough Pumpkin Croissants.
Since the Junkers grow all their own veg, they tend to have a ready supply of pumpkins and are always looking for new ways to use them. Since pumpkins have a buttery sweetness (his family's favourite variety is Crown Prince), he has substituted some of the butter and sugar with some roasted pumpkin. It gives the croissants a warm colour and a hint of nutty pumpkin flavour.
Torsten said of his recipe, "These pumpkin croissants are my favourite so far, I was slightly concerned that the pumpkin might make them heavy, but in combination with the Foricher T45 these are some of the lightest softest yet."
Makes 12-16 croissants
Method
Prepare and roast the pumpkin then refrigerate so that it is cold before proceeding to use it in the recipe.
Mix dough ingredients together until smooth and leave to rise for 5-6 hours at room temperature (approx 20C) including 3-ish stretch-and-folds within this time until soft silky smooth pillowy feeling.
Put the butter between 2 butter wrappers and whack it with a rolling pin until the butter is even across 2/3 the butter paper. Use this size to roll out your dough into a rectangle large enough so that the butter can easily fit into 1/3 of its area.
Chill butter and dough for 20 mins.
Take dough and butter out of fridge and place the rectangle of butter across the middle third of the sheet of dough.
Fold the 1/3 of the sheet dough each side of the butter over the butter, so that it is completely enveloped within the dough, press the edges together to seal the butter inside.
It is important to keep the butter and dough cool while it is worked to avoid moisture moving from the butter into the dough as it softens. This is very much easier with a dough sheeter as it helps to keep the dough cool and gives a much more uniform dough. It means that the roll and folds can all be done in one operation, rather than having to chill the dough regularly and roll by hand. If your dough isn't quite cold enough you could chill it half way through the lamination process.
Using the dough sheeter, roll the dough out to the same size rectangle you started with and letter-fold again. You should aim for 4 letter-folds which will get you to 27 layers. Add another if you are keen to.
Rest in fridge at least overnight (or longer if you wish).
Roll out using the dough sheeter to approx 8-10mm thick.
Cut into long triangles and then roll up from the short side towards the long point.
Place onto a tray and leave to rise for 8-9 hours at room temperature (approx 20C, if the temperature is higher then less time will be needed)
Preheat oven to 200C (turn off fan) with a tray of water at the bottom to produce steam
Bake 10mins then turn oven down to 170C for 20mins
