Morning Pastries If you've ever walked the streets of Paris in the early morning hours, then you've probably smelled that irresistible aroma wafting up through sidewalk grills from underground. What you might not realize is that you're standing above the workshop of a French bakery, where the day's hot pastries are being pulled out of the ovens. Down below, small armies of bakers work in subterranean kitchens, preparing for the masses who arrive every morning to retrieve their breakfast of a croissant, a brioche, or maybe a raisin roll; eating their baked breakfast treats is a national pastime for the French. Meanwhile, kilos of dough are proofing as busy hands pat and roll, fold and turn, and shape, coil, and curl what will be tomorrow's morning treats. They're impossible to resist, so just follow your nose. Whether you come out with a traditional croissant, an apple turnover, or any one of the multitudes of these morning pastries, you can be sure that they all share that memorable smell of sweet, buttery, yeasted pastry. Three categories of doughs make up this chapter's morning pastries. Croissant and Danish Dough are made with yeast and layered with butter.

Brioche and Bobka also have yeast, but in their case the butter is mixed directly into the dough. That leaves Puff Pastry, the crispiest, flakiest dough of all. Yeast-free, it gets its rise from repeated folding and layering of the buttery dough. No matter which dough or method, these classic pastries are all about butter. Not margarine-butter! My preference is imported Normandy butter. It's high in butterfat with a low water content, a deep yellow color, and unmistakably superior flavor. Look for it in specialty markets or ask your local cheese seller to track some down for you. Some of the best domestic butters are made by small dairies across the country: Strauss Family Creamery on the West Coast and Egg Farm Dairy on the East Coast are two good choices.

Supermarket varieties such as Plugra and Land O Lakes are also good-quality and widely available. Butter, when folded into dough, acts as the separating agent, miraculously turning a slab into hundreds of flaky layers. For butter to work its magic, a few simple rules must be applied in this sensitive process. Do your preparation in a cool room, preferably on a chilled work surface that's large enough to accommodate the dough as you roll it out. Most important, the dough and butter must be the same consistency; neither one should be colder or harder than the other. To be sure, beat the butter and knead it by hand or soften it in a mixer with the paddle attachment. The butter should remain cool but malleable. If it's too soft and greasy, it will ooze out of the dough; if it's too firm, it might break through the dough.

As you roll it out, work quickly and handle the dough as little as possible, so the heat of your hands doesn't melt the butter. Allow the dough its resting time for easy, stress-free rolling and to help maintain the layers. The buttery doughs that get an extra boost from yeast need time to rise, or, as we say in the baking world, proof. Proofing time will vary, depending on the weather, the temperature of your kitchen, and the size of the dough. Keep an eye on your dough-when it's slightly puffy and spongy to the touch, it's ready to be baked. All of these doughs have a fairly long shelf life when properly stored. Yeasted doughs should never be kept longer than one or two days in the refrigerator; they become overly sour and the yeast loses its strength. They can, however, be frozen for up to two months.

You can freeze the dough in separately wrapped sections, removing portions of it as you need it for a recipe and defrosting it to roll out and assemble the pastries. The method I prefer is to make the dough, assemble the pastries, and freeze them until you're ready to bake them and eat them. Pastries made with yeast must be brought up to room temperature or.