Today, I got to put my procurement skills to use. I'm helping to plan a bunch of focus groups and I need to order the all important food. And since I order food, indirectly, with tax payer dollars, it is important for me to schlep around getting quotes on how much food will cost. After nearly a week of calling around, visiting lunch spots and researching online, I went with the Croissant Tree. Mmmmm... croissants.
I like to think of myself as an intermediate level cook, however the only croissants I have ever attempted were these:
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I know that it takes a long time and lots of patience to make croissants from scratch - and to be honest, I would rather just buy them from the store. Today's question is: what is the origin of the croissant?
A: The answer for this one fascinated me. Apparently, there is a long standing myth about where the croissant came from. In the 1938 book, Larousse Gastronomique by Alfred Gottschalk, it was detailed that the croissant was created in 1686 in Budapest, Hungary by a courageous and watchful baker, at a time when the city was being attacked by the Turks. Working late one night, he heard odd rumbling noises and alerted the city's military leaders. They found that the Turks were trying to get into the city by tunnelling under the city's walls. The tunnel was destroyed and the baker became a hero. However, the baker asked no reward other than the exclusive right to bake crescent-shaped pastries commemorating the incident, the crescent being the symbol of Islam.
This story has been reproduced and become the accepted history of this delicious, flaky and buttery bread. Unfortunately, it just a myth that has been accepted as truth. The real history of the croissant is less dramatic. The croissant originated in France in the 1830s. It was an adaptation by the Austrian baker, August Zang, of the Austrian bread called the kipfel. The first croissant recipe was published in 1891, but it wasn't the same kind of croissant we are familiar with today, the flakier version was subsequently published in 1905 in France.
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