From the composer help create-project
command
The create-project command creates a new project from a given
package into a new directory. If executed without params and in a
directory with a composer.json file it installs the
packages for the current project.
You can use this command to bootstrap new projects or setup a clean
version-controlled installation for developers of your project.[version]
You can also specify the version with the package name using = or : as
separator.
To install unstable packages, either specify the version you want, or
use the –stability=dev (where dev can be one of RC,
beta, alpha or dev).
This command works:
composer create-project laravel/laravel=4.1.27 your-project-name --prefer-dist
This works with the * notation.