Our friends Jim and Colleen kindly invited us over last weekend for dinner and to watch the Green Bay playoff game. I wanted to bring a dessert but was drawing a blank on what to make. Then the idea hit me: éclairs. Jim recently mentioned to me how much he loves éclairs. I had no idea; apparently I've been unfairly pigeonholing him as a strictly chocolate cake guy for years. And even though I was at Jim and Colleen's wedding, I have zero memory of the croquembouche that they served at the reception.
I wanted to try Dorie Greenspan's recipe for "Bubble Eclairs" from Baking Chez Moi. So first I made the vanilla pastry cream recipe from the same cookbook. I scraped the seeds from a vanilla bean and steeped both the pod and the seeds in milk for about 20 minutes; brought the milk back to a boil and added a tempered mixture of egg yolks, sugar, and cornstarch; boiled the mixture for a couple of minutes; put it through a sieve; let it cool slightly; finished it off with some butter; and then chilled the custard for a few hours.
After the pastry cream was in the fridge, I turned to the bubble éclair recipe and had to deal with the consequences of my poor planning. Dorie's choux pastry recipe calls for a half cup of milk. The pint of milk I had used to make the pastry cream turned out to be all of the milk we had on hand. I was feeling unmotivated to run to the store in the sub-freezing weather, so I just decided to use a different choux pastry recipe that didn't require milk. I went with Rose Levy Beranbaum's "Cordon Rose Cream Puff Pastry," which is designed to produce a light interior and crisp crust, due to the addition of egg whites. (And I'll note that Beranbaum says that using water in choux pastry makes a lighter puff than milk because milk causes the eggs to coagulate sooner.)
I brought water, butter, sugar, and salt to a boil; added flour; cooked the mixture for a few minutes; and then transferred the mixture to my stand mixer and incorporated eggs and egg whites. I piped out the éclairs on a Silpat-lined pan using a pastry bag fitted with a large plain tip. I baked the éclairs in an oven preheated to 425 degrees, dropping the temperature to 350 degrees after 10 minutes. After the éclairs were golden, I cut slits in the sides, put them on a rack on top of a baking sheet, and let them dry out and cool in the turned off oven.
My éclairs were inconsistent. Some of them puffed up quite nicely, but some looked like they had collapsed a little during baking. Because some of the éclairs were not that tall, I decided to cut them in half horizontally to fill them, instead of attempting to fill them though holes on the bottom or side. I piped the chilled pastry cream onto the bottom half of each éclair and dipped the tops in a chocolate ganache glaze.
I thought the éclairs were okay. But they were not as crisp as I would have hoped. I had baked some loaves of brioche right before I baked these éclairs and I had placed the loaf pans on two doubled up sheet pans to prevent the bottoms of the brioche from browning too quickly. I realized that I had accidentally used the same set up doubled up sheet pans to bake the éclairs. I not sure if the double layer of pans, along with the Silpat (which I had used because Beranbaum says that the dough will stick to parchment), might have slowed down the baking process; perhaps I should have baked the éclairs a little longer. Also, while the pastry cream was delicious, it was very thick and somewhat heavy. I think the éclairs would have been better if I had folded some whipped cream into the pastry cream to lighten it first. But I have complete faith in Rose Levy Beranbaum and her recipes, so I'd like to try making these éclairs again so that I can get them right.
Recipes: "Vanilla Pastry Cream" from Baking Chez Moi by Dorie Greenspan; "Cordon Rose Cream Puff Pastry" and "Éclairs" from The Pie and Pastry Bible by Rose Levy Beranbaum.
Previous Post: "Want Coffee with Dessert?: Coffee Éclairs," June 7, 2010.
I wanted to try Dorie Greenspan's recipe for "Bubble Eclairs" from Baking Chez Moi. So first I made the vanilla pastry cream recipe from the same cookbook. I scraped the seeds from a vanilla bean and steeped both the pod and the seeds in milk for about 20 minutes; brought the milk back to a boil and added a tempered mixture of egg yolks, sugar, and cornstarch; boiled the mixture for a couple of minutes; put it through a sieve; let it cool slightly; finished it off with some butter; and then chilled the custard for a few hours.
After the pastry cream was in the fridge, I turned to the bubble éclair recipe and had to deal with the consequences of my poor planning. Dorie's choux pastry recipe calls for a half cup of milk. The pint of milk I had used to make the pastry cream turned out to be all of the milk we had on hand. I was feeling unmotivated to run to the store in the sub-freezing weather, so I just decided to use a different choux pastry recipe that didn't require milk. I went with Rose Levy Beranbaum's "Cordon Rose Cream Puff Pastry," which is designed to produce a light interior and crisp crust, due to the addition of egg whites. (And I'll note that Beranbaum says that using water in choux pastry makes a lighter puff than milk because milk causes the eggs to coagulate sooner.)
I brought water, butter, sugar, and salt to a boil; added flour; cooked the mixture for a few minutes; and then transferred the mixture to my stand mixer and incorporated eggs and egg whites. I piped out the éclairs on a Silpat-lined pan using a pastry bag fitted with a large plain tip. I baked the éclairs in an oven preheated to 425 degrees, dropping the temperature to 350 degrees after 10 minutes. After the éclairs were golden, I cut slits in the sides, put them on a rack on top of a baking sheet, and let them dry out and cool in the turned off oven.
I thought the éclairs were okay. But they were not as crisp as I would have hoped. I had baked some loaves of brioche right before I baked these éclairs and I had placed the loaf pans on two doubled up sheet pans to prevent the bottoms of the brioche from browning too quickly. I realized that I had accidentally used the same set up doubled up sheet pans to bake the éclairs. I not sure if the double layer of pans, along with the Silpat (which I had used because Beranbaum says that the dough will stick to parchment), might have slowed down the baking process; perhaps I should have baked the éclairs a little longer. Also, while the pastry cream was delicious, it was very thick and somewhat heavy. I think the éclairs would have been better if I had folded some whipped cream into the pastry cream to lighten it first. But I have complete faith in Rose Levy Beranbaum and her recipes, so I'd like to try making these éclairs again so that I can get them right.
Previous Post: "Want Coffee with Dessert?: Coffee Éclairs," June 7, 2010.
Comments