I have been trying to make more laminated dough recipes this year, since I discovered the wonderfulness that is Costco purchasing my butter – the sheer amount of butter I can stock up means that I can tackle the more classically French, butter-centric recipes that I usually stayed away from to conserve my butter for more small-batch recipes. My friend Nadine gifted me with a delightful ingredient called kecap manis(pronounced keh-chahp mah-nee), and it is a sweet Indonesian soy sauce that tastes almost like molasses. It is usually used in savory dishes, like nasi goreng, but it has a lot of potential for sweet recipes as well. In this case, I wanted to use the kecap manis in a whipped butter, and that butter in a fast-tracked kouign amann! When I say fast track, typically for kouign amann, croissants, danishes, or puff pastry in general, the process involves making a yeasted dough and a butter block, then folding and refrigerating and then repeating those steps over and over again to create these flaky, thin layers of crispy dough upon baking. Usually you have to wait at least 20 minutes during each refrigeration cycle, and since you have to roll, fold, and refrigerate at least 3 times, that takes at least an hour. In this case, I am expediting the process by making the dough, making a whipped butter, and then layering up the dough with the whipped butter, then refrigerating it once. By doing that, I am at least cutting out 40 minutes of wait time!

For the the components, we are making kouign amann dough that is layered up with a whipped kecap manis butter, and are stuffing the kouign amann themselves with a caramel made with peanut butter and toasted peanuts. I love the combination of kouign amann with peanut, because it reminds me of peanut brittle. There is a salty-sweet quality to these kouign amann that I just adore, especially when contrasted against the flaky, caramelized dough. I would say that the biggest challenge with this recipe is time management. The dough itself still needs to sit for at least 6 hours before you can stack it up. While you are waiting on that dough, I would advise you work on the kecap manis butter, just to have that ready, and the peanut caramel, since you do not want that to be warm when you assemble your kougin amann, otherwise that could prematurely melt your butter or harm the yeast in your dough. I do have a majority of this recipe weighed out in grams, since you need to be fairly precise to guarantee even layers of butter and dough. I also roll my dough in Indian rock sugar, but you can totally use any coarse sugars, like turbinado or muscavado, if you do not have Indian rock sugar to use instead! These kouign amann are the perfect pastry to eat with a cup of coffee in the morning, which was a bit of a morning tradition for me since I made enough to last me through two weeks(I doubled the recipe that I posted below since I was feeling a little power-trippy with my Costco volumes of butter)!

Makes 8 kouign amann:
For the croissant dough:
375g bread flour
50g granulated sugar
15g unsalted butter
7g active-dry yeast + 11g water
145g water
80g milk
7g salt

In a bowl, mix together the bread flour, sugar, the 15g softened butter, active-dry yeast, water, milk, and salt first, kneading everything together until a soft, smooth dough has formed. Cover the dough, and allow it to proof in the refrigerator for at least 6 hours, or overnight.

For the kecap manis butter:
176g unsalted butter
20g kecap manis

In a bowl, whip the butter and kecap manis together until fully combined.

For initial assembly:
To assemble the laminated dough, start by rolling out your 12 pieces of dough to be roughly 6 inches in diameter. Spread onto all but one piece of dough roughly 15 to 16g of butter. Stack all of your dough circles on top of one another, leaving the one that had no butter spread on it to place on top of the entire stack. Wrap the dough and refrigerate for another 2 hours.

Dust the dough with flour and then roll out the dough to be roughly 12 inches by 12 inches. Cut the dough into 8 squares.

For the peanut caramel:
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/4 cup peanut butter
1/4 cup toasted peanuts
1 tbsp kecap manis

In a pan, heat up the sugar until it reaches an amber-brown color. Take the sugar off heat and stir in the other ingredients until a sweet peanut paste with peanuts running through it forms. Allow the caramel to cool completely before attempting to use in the final assembly.

For final assembly:
1 egg yolk
1/4 cup Indian rock sugar, can substitute with turbinado sugar if needed!

Brush one side of the dough squares with some beaten egg yolk, and sprinkle some Indian rock sugar on top. Flip the squares over and lower them into 4-inch ring molds. Place a 2 tbsp scoop of the peanut caramel into each dough square and fold the corners of the dough around the filling. Let the dough sit at room temperature for 3 hours.

Bake the kouign amann at 400 degrees F for 20 minutes, rotating the pan halfway through the baking process to ensure even baking. Allow the kouign amann to fully cool before unmolding.