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I'm planning to make croissants for thanksgiving this year, I've made them before but found it nearly impossible to roll out after keeping the laminated dough in the fridge over night. The dough was impossibly hard and I probably spent around an hour literally banging on the dough with a rolling pin before it would be ready to fold again.

Is there an ideal temperature that the fridge should be at? Or maybe am I supposed to let the dough warm up before rolling it out again? Or is there something else I'm missing?

binarylegit
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  • You might be interested in an alternate technique : http://cooking.stackexchange.com/a/45403/67 – Joe Nov 09 '15 at 20:01
  • If you have a local small 'owner operated' bakery, ask them to make your puff pastry (croissant dough) to order, as they should have the required large electric rollers. Doing it by hand is just painful. It takes them just a couple of minutes. Small cost, better dough – TFD Nov 09 '15 at 23:30

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Let the dough warm back up. You put it in the fridge to firm up and develop glutens between folding in more butter, but once you are done, you make your croissants right then and there or if refrigerating your pastry dough, you need to bring it back up to workable temp.

I use a cooling rack for this, well I use it for anything I need to cool or thaw, it helps prevent the heat or cold from being stored in the surface its sitting on and lets more air move around it which speeds up cooling and thawing.

Escoce
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  • Exactly. Expecting butter firmed by refrigeration to be malleable is problematic. Allowing the dough to soften naturally by letting the temp rise slowly is the most sensible option. – Catija Nov 09 '15 at 19:23
  • I tried a different recipe and didn't have the same problem oddly. At any rate I imagine just airing it out would be fine. The directions on my current recipe stated that you should let it rise at about 75 deg. F so it doesn't seem that the butter is required to stay super cold. – binarylegit Dec 01 '15 at 17:14
  • It's doesn't need to _stay_ cold once the pastry dough has been made, it needs to start out and stay cold during the pastry making process. You let it rise after the butter has been cut in, it's been cooked and glutens have been allowed to develop and then rolled buttered again and folded (if making layered pastry). Once that is done, you can treat it anyway you want depending on its use and purpose. – Escoce Dec 01 '15 at 18:26
  • Cooked above should have been cooled... Sorry – Escoce Dec 01 '15 at 18:32