On test:
Plain flour, protein 11.3%
Bread flour, protein 12%
00 flour, protein 12.5%
Plain flour is surprisingly excellent for croissants, takes a good bit of kneading, and this isn’t exactly a fair test with the others as I used a different folding technique (1 x book fold, 2 x letter fold was used with the plain flour croissants) and I didn’t control the proof well, so it took several hours to reach triple the size. But these are just lovely and short… Not exactly authentic, a bit shorter than a typical croissant but quite delicious.
The following were made with 1 x single fold, then 3 x letter folds. They were also proved in an oven with a tray of boiled water at the bottom, and the door held ajar with a wooden spoon, which was much better and allowed them to complete their proving in well under 2 hours compared with the over 3 hours than the plan flour croissants took.
Bread flour, as you can see from the pictures, develops more uniform air pockets, much smaller ones and everything feels … “doughier”. Now these weren’t proved for quite as long as the 00 flour croissants, which I’m sure would improve this a little, you can see in the centre of these croissants there was a small patch of density that should be a little more expanded. But the texture is less pleasing in general and I believe it’s safe to say that while these are still perfectly tasty, and better than most shop bought croissants, there are better options for flour.
00 flour, I think, was just right. Quite dense and play-doh like to knead, but upon proving held onto the air beautifully, creating soft, irregular pockets on the inside and a flakey exterior.