“It’s useful being top banana in the shock department.”
THE MOVIE
Breakfast at Tiffany's is arguably Audrey Hepburn's most identifiable role, with her famous cigarette-holder pose adorning students' walls and coffee mugs all over the place. This somewhat universal love of her portrayal of Holly Golightly makes it even more surprising to learn that Truman Capote, whose 1958 novella inspired the 1961 film, hated the idea of Hepburn playing Golightly – he had wanted Marilyn Monroe instead. Brushing the mortifying depiction of Mr Yunioshi by Mickey Rooney aside, this swoonsome flick features Hepburn in a number of darling gowns (and curtain-tassle ear plugs!) swanning around throwing gin parties in a one-bedroomed flat that boasts a bathtub as a sofa. And that's not to mention Cat, Moon River or Hannibal as a young man. Oh golly gee damn!
THE SCENE
The film opens on the empty early dawn streets of New York City. We see Holly Golightly get out of a cab outside Tiffany's dressed to the nines from the night before. She shuffles over to the window in her black gown and diamonds, before reaching into her brown paper bag and coming out with coffee and a pastry. Apart from gin, it's pretty much the only thing she consumes for the entire film. She explains: "I don't want to own anything until I find a place where me and things go together. I'm not sure where that is but I know what it is like. It's like Tiffany's."
THE FOOD
We've recreated Holly's early-morning pastries by making mini croissants. We're cheating and using ready-rolled puff pastry to put together our little breakfast treats. They're stuffed with chocolate to make them more fun to enjoy with a cup of hot coffee.
INGREDIENTS
1 x ready-rolled sheet of puff pastry
A good handful of chocolate chips
1 free-range egg
1 splash of milk
Icing sugar
Makes 16 mini croissants
METHOD
Pre-heat your oven to 180C/160C fan/Gas Mark 4 and lining a baking tray with greaseproof baking paper.
Roll out the sheet of puff pastry and slice it in half. Slice each half into four rectangles, so that you have eight rectangles all together. Cut each rectangle in half until you have sixteen triangles.
To make a Golightly Croissant, take one triangle and sprinkle about a teaspoon of chocolate chips down the centre of each triangle. Starting at the wider end, roll each triangle up. Shape the croissant into the familiar crescent shape, closing off the edges of the croissant while doing so. Layer the croissants onto the baking sheet.
Beat the egg and the splash of milk in a small bowl. Use a pastry brush to coat each croissant with the egg wash.
Bake in the oven for 20 to 25 minutes until golden brown and risen.
Serve with a sprinkling of icing sugar and a cup of coffee.
If you’re in need of some visual instructions to help recreate our Golightly Croissants at home, see irishtimes.com for the Movie Bites kitchen diaries