This is a beautiful croissant muffin, attractive colour, rich layers, crisp on the outside and fluffy on the inside, very delicious! The most troublesome problem of making Danish bread is to roll out the laminated dough. This bread uses a very simple method to make the laminated dough, which saves effort and does not cause the mixing problem.

Chicago Metallic Giant Muffin Pan
https://amzn.to/316L78t

▶Ingredients

Recipe for 6 giant muffin：

❀Pâte Fermentée

Bread Flour 45 g

0.25g Instant Yeast ～1/8 tsp

水 30 g

0.8g Salt ～1/8 tsp

❀Dough Ingredients

Bread Flour 330 g

Caster Sugar 50 g

Instant Yeast 6 g

Salt 5 g

Pâte Fermentée ～68 g

Whole Egg 35 g

Cold Water 80 g

Milk 70 g

Unsalted Butter 35 g

❀Laminating

Unsalted Butter 105 g

▶Recipe

1. This bread uses Pâte Fermentée, and it need to be made 12 hours in advance. 45g bread flour, add a little less than 1/8tsp of instant yeast, 30g water. Mix well and knead until the surface is smooth.

2. Add 1/8tsp table salt. Knead for about 5-6 minutes until the dough is smooth. The dough can be pulled into thick membrane. After covering, ferment at room temperature 22-25C for about 1 hour to 1.5 times the size.Gently rub the dough to exhaust air. Cover it and put it in the refrigerator to ferment for more than 12 hours before use.

3. Making bread the next day, add 330g bread flour, 50g caster sugar, add 70g milk, 35g whole egg, 80g cold water, leave 15g to adjust the wetness of the dough. About 68g Pâte Fermentée.

4. Stir with low speed 2nd gear. Adjust the amount of cold water appropriately according to the water absorption of the flour. Stir until there is no dry flour. Add 6g instant yeast, stir until almost uniform. The mixed dough is softer, but slightly harder than ordinary bread dough. Put the dough in the refrigerator for 20 minutes (if the room temperature is below 20°C in winter, you don’t need to refrigerate).

5. Add 5g table salt. Stir evenly at low speed 2 gears. Then turn on the medium speed 3rd gear and beat until the dough is smoother, it takes about 3 minutes. You can add butter when the dough can be pulled into a malleable membrane with not very smooth surface and jagged holed. Put in 35g of softened unsalted butter. Divide the dough into small pieces for easy mixing with the butter.

6. Turn on low speed 2 and stir until the butter is mixed into the dough. It takes about 5-6 minutes. Then knead at medium speed 4 for about 8-9 minutes until the dough is smooth and elastic. The kneaded dough can be pulled into tough and translucent membrane with almost no jagged edges around the hole. Fold the dough until smooth. Put it in an oiled bowl, cover and ferment to 1.5 times its size. It takes about 45 minutes at 26°C. Flatten the dough, roll it out into a rectangle, cover it and put it in the refrigerator for 1 hour.

7. Roll out the refrigerated dough into a rectangle about 24x36cm. Then cut into 6 small pieces. Roll out the small piece of dough into a 14x36cm rectangle with a thickness of about 1mm. If the dough shrinks when rolled out, cover it and put it in the refrigerator for 30 minutes before rolling it out.

8. Brush a layer of butter on the surface of the dough. You can also use a dough press to press the small dough into a rectangle about 14x36cm. Spread the second piece of dough on top of the butter. After brushing a layer of butter, spread another piece of dough. After laying the 6 pieces of dough, cut into 2 halves from the middle. Brush half of the dough with butter and stack the 2 pieces together. This completes the 12-layer laminate dough. Chill and rest for 45 minutes.

9. Gently roll the dough into a 20x20cm square. Cut along the neat side into 18 1cm wide strips. If the butter feels too soft, put it back in the refrigerator for 20 minutes. Use 3 pieces of dough for the styling. If you feel that this shape is complicated, you can use 3 ropes to practice proficiency in advance.

10. Put it into a muffin mold with a diameter of 3.5″ and a height of 2″. Cover and proof until double size. At a temperature of 28°C, it will take about 2 hours. Brush a thin layer of whole egg evenly to increase the surface gloss of the bread. Bake at the middle lower rack in an oven preheated to 400°F/200°C for about 20 minutes until the surface is golden. After 8-10 minutes when the surface of the bread is coloured, reduce the temperature to 330°F/165°C. The surface is crispy and the inside is fluffy, very delicious!