Have you ever tasted real French choux à la crème ? Do you want to know how to make one of the most famous French pastries in the world ? In this article, you will find all the steps to make crispy and fluffy homemade choux like a professional baker.
INGREDIENTS
And don't miss the disclaimer at the end of this recipe !
CRACKER:
- 40 g soft butter
- 50 g brown sugar
- 50 g flour
- 1 pinch of fleur de sel
CARAMELISED NUTS:
- 100 g nuts
- 60 g sugar
CHOUX PASTRY:
- 125 g water
- 125 g semi-skimmed milk
- 110 g butter
- 250 g egg
- 1 rounded teaspoonfuls of caster sugar
- ½ slightly rounded teaspoon of fleur de sel
- 145 g flour
PASTRY CREAM:
- 250 g skimmed milk
- 1 vanilla pod
- 3 egg yolks
- 40 g caster sugar
- 15 gr corn starch
- 10 g flour
- 1 g agar-agar
- 25 g butter
WHIPPED CREAM:
- 300 gr of heavy cream (with minimum 30% of fat)
- 1 ½ vanilla pod
DIRECTIONS
CRACKER:
- Mix all the ingredients together evenly.
- Roll it out to 2 mm thickness between two sheets of parchment paper.
- Cut out circles of dough with a cookie cutter (5cm in diameter)
- Set aside in the freezer until your choux pastry are ready to go into the oven.
CARAMELISE NUTS:
-Roasting your nuts in the oven or in a pan. Don't forget to stir from time to time to prevent the nuts from burning.
-While you let the nuts cool down slightly, prepare a caramel.
-Heat a pan over medium to high heat until the sugar begins to melt. Immediately reduce the heat to avoid burning the caramel. Mix with a spatula and once the mixture is homogeneous, pour in the previously roasted nuts.
- Carefully coat the dried fruit with the caramel while stirring with a wooden spoon to prevent nuts from burning.
- When nuts are well coated, spread them directly on a plate or on a sheet of parchment paper for quick cooling
- When cold, mix or knife the cashews coarsely.
CHOUX PASTRY:
- In a saucepan, mix the water and milk, then add the butter, salt and caster sugar.
- Heat everything over low heat for 5 minutes.
- Once the butter is well melted, bring it to a boil, then add, off the heat, and in one go, the sifted flour.
- Mix well until a homogeneous dough is obtained.
- Dry it in a saucepan, over low heat, for 1 min, without ever stopping stirring the dough. The purpose is not to cook the dough but to dry it out.
The dough is dried out when it forms a ball and there is almost no steam left when it is crushed. Remove the pan from the heat.
- Whisk the whole eggs, as for an omelette, then pour everything, gradually, in a drizzle, over the dough.
-The dough has a good texture when you run your finger through it and the track closes gently after passing.
-On a parchment paper, form 25 g balls of choux pastry with a piping bag. Smooth your choux pastry with a teaspoon to make it even. Place the previously prepared and frozen crackers on it.
-Cook the choux at 175°C/347°F, for about 20 to 25 minutes and then at 140°C/284°F 10 to 15 m.
PASTRY CREAM:
- In a saucepan, bring the milk to simmering with the vanilla pods cut in half and scraped. Let quiver over a low heat.
- Meanwhile, whisk the yolks and sugar vigorously in a bowl for 30 seconds. It’s not necessary to whiten the mixture. Add the corn flour, wheat flour and agar-agar mixture, whisk vigorously and mix well. Then, put the mixture to one side.
- When the vanilla milk quivers on the heat, remove the mixture from the heat and pour 50% (in 2 or 3 times) on the previous mixture, while whisking strongly.
- Transfer the whole thing to the saucepan where the rest of the milk is still almost boiling (scrape well so you don’t lose any vanilla seeds) and bring it to boil over medium heat.
- Cook the cream for 2 minutes. Never stop whipping to prevent the cream from sticking to the bottom of the saucepan and burning.
- Once the cream is cooked, add the butter and the agar-agar, but remove the saucepan from the heat.
- Then remove the pastry cream in a bowl, cover it well with a plastic film on contact and place it in the cold.
- Transfer the cream to a cold mixing bowl. Whisk (add air) at high speed for 3 minutes. Keep it in the fridge until it’s used.
WHIPPED CREAM:
Tip: this requires prior preparation (3 hours before doing the recipe)
- The cream must be cold before use, keep it in the refrigerator for at least 3 hours before making the recipe. Put the liquid heavy cream in the mixing bowl previously cooled. If you can, put the whisk you will use in the freezer to. Start whipping the cream at medium speed with a mixer.
- When bubbles appear, gradually increase the speed of the mixer until you obtain an ultra silky cream with a good hold. Add the previously scraped vanilla grains and mix gently with a spatula.
- Keep the cream in the fridge until ready to use.
PRESENTATION:
- For the presentation, feel free to use your imagination. You can cut the the choux pastry in half and add the creams, or you can also fill the choux directly with the pastry cream mixture.
- At the end, don't forget to sprinkle them with a hint of icing sugar
Then, you're ready to enjoy these cream puffs!
Disclaimer : This is a simple and concise recipe from my personal course. I wanted to give the clearest information as possible. If you want to make sure you succeed choux à la crème , you can order my course on Udemy. You will find the complete and detailed recipe in videos. I give you all my personal advices that nobody (even professional) tells on Youtube or on baking forums to master this pastry.
Click here : https://bit.ly/2RU9RcU
See you soon for more recipes !
Lea from The Paris-Best
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