A light, flaky pastry shaped like a crescent, typically filled with butter and often eaten for breakfast.
From French 'croissant', meaning crescent, derived from the present participle of 'croître' (to grow or increase). The pastry was named for its distinctive crescent shape.
Austrian bakers actually invented the crescent pastry in the 17th century, but the French perfected the lamination technique and claimed it as their own—a delicious example of cultural food theft that changed European cuisine forever.
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