Made from scratch chocolate croissants- Recipe #1 of 52 new recipes for the new year.

Ever since seeing the movie It's Complicated, I have been obsessed with making chocolate croissants from scratch. Since one of my new year's resolutions is to make one new recipe a week for the full year, I thought why not start off 2012 with a bang! So I researched several recipes, picked one out, and went right to work.

Making croissants is a little bit time-consuming (you have breaks in between the dough chilling), but it is super easy and totally worth it. They are SO much better than store-bought crescent rolls and don't have that fake butter taste like the ones in the frozen foods section. Eek.

Here is the recipe I selected! It was borrowed from chickensintheroad.com.

Step 1
1 1/3 cups cold butter
3 cups all-purpose flour

Cut butter into 1/2-inch slices. Mix with 3 cups flour in a bowl and chill while preparing Step 2.

Step 2
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 package yeast
1 1/4 cups milk
1/4 cup sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 egg

Combine 1 1/2 cups flour and yeast in a large mixing bowl. Meanwhile, heat milk, sugar and salt in a pan on the stove till warm. Add to yeast-flour mixture along with the egg. Beat with an electric mixer for 30 seconds on low, then on high for 3 minutes.

Step 3
Stir in chilled butter-flour mixture. Flouring hands, knead dough very gently, punching about eight times. Using a floured rolling pin, roll out on a floured surface into a large rectangle (about 20 inches by 10 inches). Fold dough into thirds, wrap, and refrigerate for at least 1 1/2 hours or overnight (or freeze for 30 minutes).

Step 4
Take dough out of refrigerator. Using a floured rolling pin again, roll dough out on a floured surface into a rectangle as described in Step 3. Fold, wrap, and chill dough again, this time for at least 4 hours or overnight.

Step 5
Remove dough from refrigerator and divide into fourths (*I did mine in thirds) by cutting the dough. Shape each piece into a ball. At this point, you can either use the dough right away, refrigerate it for up to a week, or freeze it for later use. Wrap balls in plastic wrap and store inside a Ziploc baggie. Thaw frozen dough to use. To use immediately, put on a floured surface and using a floured rolling pin, roll out dough into a circle.

I floured my working surface, rolled a third of the dough into a very thin pizza shape with a floured rolling pin, cut it into 12 pizza-slice shapes, and then put chocolate chips on the fat end of each slice of dough. Then I rolled them up, pinched the ends together, and placed them on a greased baking sheet.

Next, I whisked an egg white with one tablespoon of water and brushed each croissant with it.

Finally, I sprinkled each croissant with a little salt, preheated the oven to 375 and baked them for 10-15 minutes.

All done and super delicious!!!

There is something about making your own bread that makes you feel like a legitimate homemaker. Sure made me proud. Haha I was so worried that they wouldn't come out right but they were perfect. So if I can do it, then that means you can.