Because of how tedious these are to make, there are only about a dozen Cristo Amanns available each day.
Photo by Lauren Drewes Daniels
In the world of food, the one thing I get most excited about is a kouign-amann pastry. This small, delicate roll is a simple delight made of laminated dough with a bit of sugar and a touch of salt. It’s born from the Brittany region of France.
This fascination began after I met Andrea Meyer, owner of the now-sadly-shuttered Bisou Bisou, who told me about her journey to perfect it. She had been traveling in Brittany, France, and bought a kouign-amann from a street vendor. It was so amazing that five years later, she returned to the very street, looking for the very vendor who sold it to her, hoping to learn his trade secrets and bring it to her bakery in Dallas.
Unfortunately, that particular vendor had retired. Persistent, she found another baker in the village willing to teach her the trade; she staged in a French bakery for a week, learning how to make just this one pastry. Bisous Bisous shuttered in 2024.
Kouign-amann fairy tales endure in Dallas, however. Alison Weinstein and her daughter Ashley first had a kouign-amann at Chanson Bakery in New York City, and it was the impetus to opening their bakery in Dallas, Sugar and Sage. Luckily, chef Jill Bates shared their love of Brittany’s first pastry.
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What makes a kouign-amann so special?
One of the key aspects of a kouign-amann is the butter, a specialty of Brittany, France; the large peninsula in the northwest corner of the country gets abundant rainfall over grasslands where cows graze, producing a rich cream, which is then sprinkled with local sea salt for exceptional flavor.
Sugar and Sage uses Isigny Sainte-Mère Beurre de Tourage from Normandy. It’s the Cadillac of butters.
The salted butter is worked into the dough with a little bit of sugar, then laminated like a croissant. The dough is then folded (or rounded, depending on the style the baker prefers) and placed in a pan. Steam from the butter heats and releases, puffing the pastry up, while the bottom and sides caramelize in the sugar. A golden, slightly brown exterior gives way to a pale interior that is a touch crispy on the outside and soft as angel wings on the inside. After cooking, the pastries are quickly flipped out of the pan (a hazard if not done carefully) so that the sugar doesn’t harden.
Really nothing else needs to happen here. The pastry doesn’t need fillings or coatings, though some places around Dallas, like at Kuluntu Bakery, do it well.
The Cristo Amann
Chef Bates’ kouign-amanns regularly draw lines and sell out. But her newest creation — the Cristo Amann — is a playful take. A kouign-amann is split in half, dipped in egg batter and griddled in brown butter, then stuffed with griddled ham and melted gruyère. The sandwich is served with a raspberry preserve that has just a touch of chili, which is a wonderful (and clever) touch.
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It’s devilishly good. The simple pastry becomes a beautiful sandwich. Because these are so much work — and made to order — there are only 15 or so a day, starting at 11 a.m. each day. Good luck.