Croissant

Croissant is a buttery, flaky, viennoiserie or Vienna-style pastry named for its well-known crescent shape. Croissants and other viennoiserie are made of a layered yeast-leavened dough. The dough is layered with butter, rolled and folded several times in succession, then rolled into a sheet, in a technique called laminating. The process results in a layered, flaky texture, similar to a puff pastry.

Although it is Austrian in origin, most people associate it with French cuisine. The kipferl, ancestor of the croissant, has been documented in Austria going back at least as far as the 13th century, in various shapes. The kipferl can be made plain or with nut or other fillings (some consider the rugelach a form of kipferl).

In 1838, an Austrian artillery officer August Zang founded a Viennese bakery "Boulangerie Viennoise" at 92, rue de Richelieu in Paris. This bakery, which served Viennese specialities including the kipferl and the Vienna loaf, quickly became popular and inspired French imitators (and the concept, if not the term, of viennoiserie, a 20th-century term for supposedly Vienna-style pastries). The French version of the kipferl was named for its crescent (croissant) shape and has become an identifiable shape across the world.