Cream Puff Paste Food

CLASSIC CREAM PUFFS

Steps:

• Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper.
• In a medium saucepan over medium-high heat, combine butter, sugar, salt and 1 cup water. Bring to a boil and quickly stir in the flour with a wooden spoon. Continue to stir until a film forms on the bottom of the pan.
• Remove from heat and transfer contents to a bowl to cool slightly, about 3 minutes. Add 4 eggs, one at a time, stirring vigorously to entirely incorporate egg after each addition.
• For the egg wash, whisk together the remaining egg with 1 tablespoon water. Set aside.
• Transfer the pate a choux to a large pastry bag fitted with a 5/8-inch plain tip. Pipe 1-1/2-inch rounds onto each prepared pan. Gently smooth the pointed peaks with a moistened finger, rounding tops to ensure even rising. Brush tops with reserved egg wash. Bake until puffs rise and are golden brown, about 30 minutes. Let cool on sheets on wire racks. Puffs can be stored at room temperature for up to 1 day.
• Transfer pastry cream to a pastry bag fitted with a 1/8-inch plain round tip. Insert the tip into the opening of each pastry, and pipe to fill with pastry cream. Serve immediately.

CREAM PUFFS I

Steps:

• For the custard: In a small saucepan, combine 1/2 cup sugar, 5 tablespoons flour and a pinch of salt. Stir in milk, a little at a time, until smooth. Bring to a boil over medium heat, stirring constantly. Boil 60 seconds, then pour a small amount of hot liquid into the 2 egg yolks, and stir. Then return now heated egg yolks to saucepan and stir, over heat, until mixture starts to bubble again. Remove from heat, add vanilla. Cover and chill in refrigerator.
• Preheat oven to 450 degrees F (230 degrees C).
• For the pastry: In a medium saucepan, combine shortening and water and bring to a boil. Sift together 1 cup flour and a pinch of salt and pour all at once into boiling mixture. Stir vigorously until mixture forms a ball. Remove from heat, and add eggs, one at a time, stirring vigorously after each addition. Drop by spoonfuls onto baking sheet, or pipe into desired shape.
• Bake 10 minutes in the preheated oven, then reduce heat to 400 degrees F (200 degrees C) and bake 25 minutes more, or until golden. Cool completely, split, fill with custard, and replace tops.

CREAM PUFFS

Steps:

• Make the cream puffs: In a medium saucepan, combine the butter, granulated sugar, salt and 1 cup water. Bring to a boil over medium heat. Remove the pan from the heat and sift the flour directly into the pan. Stir the mixture into a paste with a wooden spoon. Return the pan to a medium heat. Stir the mixture until it pulls away from the sides of the pan and is slightly shiny, about 3 minutes.
• Transfer the paste to a medium bowl, and beat with a wooden spoon until slightly cooled, about 2 to 3 minutes. Add the 3 eggs, one at a time, incorporating each one thoroughly before adding the next. Before adding the third egg, beat it in a small bowl. Adding it by tablespoons to the mixture, just until the batter is smooth and tight. If the batter starts to get loose, do not add all of the last egg.
• Place a rack in the middle of the oven and preheat to 400 degrees F. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
• Fill a large pastry bag, fitted with an open tip, with the cream puff mixture. Pipe twelve
• 2 1/2-inch circular mounds, about 2 inches apart, onto the prepared pan. (Alternately, use a large spoon to form the dough into the mounds.) Dab the tops of each puff with a fingertip dipped in water to smooth the tops. Beat the egg yolk with a tablespoon of water and brush the surface of the puffs with the beaten yolk.
• Bake in the middle of the oven for 15 minutes. Reduce the oven temperature to 350 degrees F; continue baking until golden brown and the puffs are light, airy, and crisp, about 30 to 35 minutes more. Cool on a rack.
• Assemble the cream puffs: Cut the puffs in half with a serrated knife, and set the tops aside. (If the puffs are very moist inside, scoop out the excess dough and re-crisp them in a 350 degree F. oven for about 5 minutes. Cool completely before continuing.) Put a heaping tablespoon of the fruit in the bottom halves of the cream puffs. Pipe or spoon about 1/3 cup of the Chocolate Whipped Cream on top. Replace the puff tops. Refrigerate for up to 3 hours or serve immediately.
• Yield: 12 cream puffs
• Beat the cream in a medium bowl with an electric mixer or a whisk, until it begins to hold a loose peak. Sift the confectioners' sugar into the cream. Continue beating until the cream holds a firm but still soft peak. Set aside.
• Put the chocolate in a clean, medium, microwaveable bowl. Melt the chocolate in the microwave, at half power, at 30 second intervals, until softened and warm. Whisk until smooth and liquid. (Alternatively melt the chocolate in a double boiler.)
• Fold about 1/2 cup of the whipped cream into the warm chocolate to lighten it. Add the lightened chocolate mixture back to the remaining whipped cream, folding until completely blended. Store in an airtight container until ready to use. It's best used the same day it is prepared.
• Yield: about 4 cups

PATE A CHOUX (CREAM PUFF PASTRY)

Steps:

• Place a bowl on your mixer and fit the paddle attachment to it.
• Put your eggs next to the mixer.
• Mix the milk, water, butter, sugar and salt in a 2-quart saucepan.
• Bring to a full boil over medium heat, stirring occasionally with a wooden spoon.
• Stirring constantly, add the flour all at once, and stir quickly and without stopping until the flour is thoroughly incorporated.
• Then continue to cook and stir for another 45 seconds, or until the dough comes into a ball and a light film of paste coats the bottom of the pan.
• Immediately scrape the dough into the bowl of your mixer, and turn the mixer on low speed.
• Let it mix for a minute or two - the first few turns of the paddle will put up a cloud of steam.
• That's fine.
• Just let it mix until no more steam is coming off the dough.
• Then add the first egg, letting it mix in fully before adding the next one.
• Keep the mixer on low speed - you don't want to incorporate too much air into the paste.
• Scrape down the bowl every 2nd egg just to make sure everything is mixing together.
• Before adding the 6th egg, stop the mixer and check the consistency of the dough.
• You will know it is perfect if, when you lift the paddle, it pulls the dough with it, then the dough breaks away and forms a peak that slowly bends down.
• If the dough is too thick and doesn't form that peak, add the last egg.
• The dough is now ready to be used to make éclairs, cream puffs, profiteroles, or any other recipe calling for choux paste.
• It should be used immediately.
• NOTES FOR MAKING CHOUX PASTE SUCCESSFULLY: The liquid must be heated to a full boil.
• Add the flour all at once and stir madly until every last speck of flour is incorporated, then keep cooking and stirring some more - it's this last bit of cooking that will take the raw taste out of the flour; you'll know you are ready to quit when the dough forms a ball around your wooden spoon and the bottom of the pan is covered with a light film of paste.
• Stop mixing when you still have one egg left to add and inspect the dough.
• Depending on the condition of the flour, the room, or the moods of the pastry gods, the dough may or may not need the last egg.
• The dough is finished when you lift the paddle and it pulls up some dough that then detaches and forms a slowly bending peak - if you don't get a peak, add another egg.
• And relax.
• Even if you can't decide what to do, add the egg - you will still get a good puff.
• Use the paste while it is warm.
• It cannot be kept.
• Unfilled puffs or éclairs can be well wrapped and frozen for a few weeks.

CREAM PUFFS

Steps:

• To make the cream puffs: Preheat the oven to 425 degrees F. In a large saucepan, bring the water, butter, salt, and granulated sugar to a rolling boil over medium-high heat. When it boils, immediately take the pan off the heat. Stirring with a wooden spoon, add all the flour at once and stir hard until all the flour is incorporated, 30 to 60 seconds. Return the pan to the heat and cook, stirring, 30 seconds to evaporate some of the moisture.
• Scrape the mixture into a mixer fitted with a paddle attachment. Mix at medium speed. With the mixer running, and working 1 egg at a time, add 3 of the eggs, stopping after each addition to scrape down the sides of the bowl. Mix until the dough is smooth and glossy and the eggs are completely incorporated. The dough should be thick, but should fall slowly and steadily from the beaters when you lift them out of the bowl. If the dough is still clinging to the beaters, add the remaining egg and mix until incorporated.
• Using a pastry bag fitted with a large plain tip, pipe the dough onto the baking sheet, in 2-inch diameter rounds or balls. Whisk the remaining egg with 1 1/2 teaspoons water. Brush the surface of the rounds with the egg wash to knock down the points (you may not use all the egg wash). Bake 15 minutes, then reduce the heat to 375 degrees F and bake until puffed up, and light golden brown, about 20 minutes more. Try not to open the oven door too often during the baking. Let cool on the baking sheet.
• To fill the cream puffs, place a pastry tip on your finger and poke a whole in the bottom of each puff. Whip the cream with the sugar and vanilla until stiff. Pipe whipped cream into each cream puff and chill until ready to serve, no more than 4 hours.
• Notes about the recipe: The moisture in the eggs turns to steam and puffs the batter to try to release itself. You can fill them with anything.

CREAM PUFF PASTE

Steps:

• Put water, butter or salt in a large heavy saucepan and bring to a boil.
• Remove from heat (butter should be completely melted) and add the flour all in one fell swoop.
• Mix as quickly as possible with a sturdy wooden spoon.
• This mixture is known as a "panade".
• Return the saucepan to the stove over the lowest possible heat. Continue to stir with the wooden spoon while the panade dries out. This will take about 5 minutes, and a thin crust will form on the bottom of the pan.
• This is supposed to happen, so don't worry about it, and don't try to scrape it up and incorporate it into the dough, or you will have plaster chips in your pastries.
• The dough should be soft, but when you pinch it between thumb and forefinger it should not stick to your hand.
• Dump the panade into a bowl, and let it cool for at least 5 minutes.
• Then add the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition.
• The mixture should be smooth and creamy looking before you add the next egg.
• After all 4 eggs have been beaten in, the dough will be shiny and satiny yellow, thick and heavy.
• Butter and flour a cookie sheet. Fill a pastry bag with the dough.
• If you don't have a pastry bag, you can use a tablespoon to drop dollops of dough onto the cookie sheet for eclairs and/or cream puffs, but you really must have a pastry bag in order to make a cream puff ring.
• For cream puffs, Squeeze out balls about the size of ping pong or golf balls.
• For eclairs, squeeze out oblongs at 3 to 4 inches long.
• If you are using the recipe given above, you should end up with 14 to 16 pastries.
• Don't succumb to the temptation to make fewer and larger ones, for they won't cook properly if you do.
• Brush the tops of the pastries with beaten egg, using the bristles of the brush to gently push down and flatten out the little curlicues left by the pastry bag as you lifted it off.
• Finally, drag the tines of a dinner fork down the length of each eclair.
• The resulting stripes will make for a more attractive and professional looking product. For a cream puff ring, first mark a 10" circle on the surface of the buttered and floured cookie sheet. Then, using a pastry gab, squeeze out a 1" wide "halo" of cream puff paste right on top of the circle you've outlined.
• Squeeze another 1" wide ring of dough adjacent to - and touching - the first. Squeeze a third ring directly over the "crack" between the other two.
• Brush the whole thing with beaten egg, and sprinkle a handful of thinly sliced almonds all over the top of the ring.
• Let the cream puffs, eclairs, or cream puff ring sit and "dry" for no less than 15 and no more than 25 minutes before baking.
• The oven should be preheated to 375F for cream puffs and/or eclairs, and to 400F for a cream puff ring.
• Bake the former at 375F for about 30 minutes, or until they have puffed up nicely and turned golden brown.
• Bake the latter at 400F for about 45 minutes, or until it is well puffed and golden brown.
• Then, turn the oven off, open the door, and leave it halfway open for an hour.
• If it won't stay ajar by itself, prop it open by wedging something in there. This is to allow steam to escape and to let the pastries cool slowly and "dry" as they cool so that they won't collapse or become soft and soggy.
• After an hour has passed, remove the pastries from the oven.
• They are now ready to be filled.
• To fill individual pastries: Cut cream puffs and eclairs in half (from side to side, not from top to bottom). Fill with whatever filling you desire. Replace lids.
• Glaze with icing or pour sauce on top.
• Serve. It is wise not to fill pastries to far in advance of the serving time. The closer the preparation time is to the serving time, the smaller the likelihood that the pastries will begin to soften or get soggy.
• To fill a cream ring: Use a slicing knife with a long serrated blade to cut the top off a cream puff ring.
• Fill the bottom with praline cream (or coffee cream, or chocolate cream) filling.
• Fill a pastry bag with sweetened whipped cream.
• use a nozzle with a zigzag edge (like pinking shears) to squeeze out a layer of fancy puff-balls of whipped cream all over the layer of praline cream filling.
• Finally, replace the lid and dust the top with 10X powdered confectioners' sugar.
• Keep the cream puff ring in a cool dry place until serving time. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - * Exported from MasterCook * PRALINE FILLING Recipe By : Homemade Good News (Vol 3 No 3) Serving Size : 1 Preparation Time :0:00 Categories : Pastries Amount Measure Ingredient -- Preparation Method -------- ------------ -------------------------------- 1 cup 10X powdered confectioners' sugar 1/2 cup almonds Make the vanilla custard cream.
• Place the sugar and nuts in a heavy saucepan and place over medium heat. Stir constantly with a wooden spoon.
• It will take a while for the sugar to melt because there is no water or other liquid in the pot. Keep on stirring! As soon as the sugar melts, it will turn into caramel.
• Immediately remove from heat and pour the caramel onto an oiled marble slab (if you have one) or onto an oiled cookie sheet (if you don't). Allow it to cool.
• When the candy has cooled, it will be hard and brittle. Break it into pieces, place the pieces in your blender or food processor, and grind them up into powder.
• Fold the praline powder into the vanilla custard cream.
• - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - NOTES : This is for Cream Puff Ring * Exported from MasterCook * CHOCOLATE ICING Recipe By : Homemade Good News (Vol 3 No 3) Serving Size : 1 Preparation Time :0:00 Categories : Frostings, Fillings, & Icings Amount Measure Ingredient -- Preparation Method -------- ------------ -------------------------------- 3 ounces bitter (unsweetened) chocolate 3 ounces semi-sweet chocolate 3/4 cup cream (heavy cream is best, but is so hard to come by that unless you have your own dairy you will probably have to use whipping cream) enough water to thin icing to desired consistency (1 or 2 Tbsp) Melt the chocolate in the cream over low heat, stirring with a wooden spoon.
• Bring to a boil.
• cool to lukewarm.
• Add water as desired.
• Spoon over eclair or cream puffs.
• - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - NOTES : This is a glaze for eclairs or sauce for cream puffs.
• If you pour the icing while it is still hot, it will run off the surface of the eclairs or cream puffs instead of sticking.
• It should be warm when you pour it. For a sweeter icing, increase the amount of semi-sweet chocolate and decrease the amount of bitter chocolate. Kim C.

CREAM PUFFS

Steps:

• Mix together vanilla instant pudding mix, cream and milk. Cover and refrigerate to set.
• Preheat oven to 425 degrees F (220 degrees C).
• In a large pot, bring water and butter to a rolling boil. Stir in flour and salt until the mixture forms a ball. Transfer the dough to a large mixing bowl. Using a wooden spoon or stand mixer, beat in the eggs one at a time, mixing well after each. Drop by tablespoonfuls onto an ungreased baking sheet.
• Bake for 20 to 25 minutes in the preheated oven, until golden brown. Centers should be dry.
• When the shells are cool, either split and fill them with the pudding mixture, or use a pastry bag to pipe the pudding into the shells.

VANILLA CREAM PUFF DESSERT

Steps:

• In a large saucepan over medium heat, bring the water, butter and salt to a boil. Add flour all at once and stir until a smooth ball forms. Continue beating until smooth and shiny. Remove from the heat; let stand for 5 minutes. Add 1 egg at a time, beating well after each addition. , Pour into a greased 15x10x1-in. baking pan. Bake at 400° until puffed and golden brown, 28-30 minutes. Cool on a wire rack., For filling, in a large bowl, beat the cream cheese, milk and pudding mixes until smooth. Spread over the crust; refrigerate for 20 minutes. Spread whipped topping over filling. Store in the refrigerator. Just before serving, drizzle with chocolate syrup.