Almond croissants

On days when the husband is in charge of the child, I they have to have a snack they can share.  This usually involves malt loaf or lots of grapes, Cheddars or croissants.  This week, I picked up some croissants from the local Tesco Express, only to be met with refusal from both of them.  The child's been fussy because she's poorly and the husband (who is just plain fussy) declared that they were too sweet.

I'll admit, they were the horrible, bog-standard supermarket type of croissants stuffed full of additives to keep them fresh, but they'd probably also turn their noses up at home made for being to crisp or buttery or something.

I'm not a fan of supermarket bakes, but when you live in a provincial town, sometimes that's the best you can do.  I refuse to buy cake any more (save for malt loaf) but I've still yet to master the art of croissant dough - that's next Sunday's task.

One of the things that I love about being in France is that pastries found in supermarkets, McDonalds (a long story) and even petrol stations (another long story) is of bakery standard.  Fresh, crisp and buttery.

I had planned to try another Dan Lepard bake today for a workshop I'm attending on Tuesday at Super-Spy HQ but still feeling rough as a badger's backside, I figured I'd have a look for something easy and comforting to do with the leftover croissants instead.

There's a croissant in there, somewhere

The very first recipe Google returned me was from Not Quite Nigella, an amazing food blog that harbours many delights, including the very yummy sounding Bacon Jam.  Yes, that's right.  Bacon Jam.  Definitely one to try before the end of the year!

NQN explains that almond croissants were first invented exactly to allow people to use up stale croissants.  They are dipped in sugar syrup, stuffed with almond paste and topped with flaked almonds before being baked and dusted with icing sugar.

As a little side experiment, I also tried melting a 25g of marzipan with a teaspoon of water in the microwave to see if it would make a decent enough almond paste.  And it did, so you could make the recipe even quicker and easier.

I think it would be better made with proper bakery-standard croissants or leftover home-made ones but it was good enough to go well with a latte and Mamma Mia for an indulgent afternoon :-)

The almond croissant recipe can be found here.  And if you don't believe me about bacon jam, check it out here.