Water, butter, eggs they don’t seem scary do they? No, but if you want to make Pate a choux pastry it may seem intimidating well, at least to me it does. I want to make eclairs and you need to make pate choux pastry first.
I mean really, how difficult can it be? Melt some butter in water add flour, stir stir and stir then stir in some eggs. In my mind I am French and a master at making pastry in a small bakery. In reality I can’t speak French swear a lot when I bake and hope it turns out and doesn’t make anyone sick. So this is my first attempt and good or bad here goes.
For those who know me, know my love/obsession with cookbooks and French ones at that. So, I gleamed through the stacks of books that I have and I decided on the recipe from Sweet Paris by Michael Paul.
They weren’t really that hard to make and by looking at the pictures they were a success and as for the reviews from my tasters they were AWESOME!
Well, I did learn one very important detail while baking. The directions say do not open the door during the baking time, it really means DO NOT OPEN THE DOOR. I learned the hard way. I opened the door when the timer went off thinking they were done. They weren’t. So when I finally took them out most of them flattened like a pancake. I filled and iced the ones the were usable and discovered that even if they are flat as pancake you can still schemer pastry cream on them and still eat them. And they are just as yummy aa the pretty ones.
Pastry Cream |
Eclairs ready for the chocolate |
My eclairs on the left compared to the ones in the book |
Finished eclairs |