Almond Croissants

Ingredients:

For puff pastry:

250g of plain flour

150ml of water

225g of cold butter

(You could use ready made pastry)

For marzipan:

90g of icing sugar

90g of caster sugar

1 egg

Almond extract

175g of ground almonds

(You could also use ready made marzipan)

1) First make the puff pastry. In a food processor, mix together the flour and water until it forms a dough, cover this in clingfilm and leave to rest in the fridge.

2) Roll the dough out on a floured surface, roll into a 25mm circle.

3) In between two pieces of clingfilm, roll out the butter into a rectangle the size of a postcard. Place the butter in the centre of the dough and fold the sides of the dough into the centre.

4) Roll the dough out in one direction, to lengthen it. Mark out the dough into three sections and fold the sections in on top of each other. Use the rolling pin to seal the dough either side by gently pressing on the open ends.

5) Turn the dough 90 degrees and roll the dough out in one direction again to lengthen it. Again, mark the dough into thirds and fold on top of itself. Repeat this one more time, cover in clingfilm and leave to cool in the fridge.

6) Repeat the rolling and folding processes twice more and leave to cool for an hour before using.

7) Preheat the oven to 180C. Then make the marzipan. In a large bowl, mix together the icing sugar and caster sugar before beating in the egg. Place the bowl over a pan of boiling water and whisk for 10 minutes or until thick and fluffy. Remove from the heat and whisk in the almond essence.

8) Stir in the ground almonds. Knead this on a surface covered in icing sugar.

9). Roll out the pastry to a 30cm x 25cm rectangle and slice in half with a sharp knife. Cut the dough into isosceles triangles. Take a small ball of marzipan, roughly the size of a marble, and roll this out into a sausage shape. Place this at the base of the triangle and roll the pastry up.

10) Place the croissants on a baking tray and bake until golden brown.