Daring Bakers Challenge August - Kat of The Bobwhites was our August 2012 Daring Baker hostess who inspired us to have fun in creating pate a choux shapes, filled with crème patisserie or Chantilly cream. We were encouraged to create swans or any shape we wanted and to go crazy with filling flavors allowing our creativity to go wild!
I've done Pate a Choux before, and it was good but it didn't work out perfectly. This time I made a few different creations: Swans, Cream Puffs, and Paris-Brest Cake. A little history about the cake:
The pastry was created in 1891 to commemorate the Paris–Brest–Paris bicycle race. Its circular shape is representative of a wheel. It became popular with riders on the Paris-Brest cycle race, partly because of its energy-giving high calorific value, and is now found in pâtisseries all over France.
The Paris-Brest cake was really fun. I watched a You-Tube video about it, although the man who baked it; his puffed up a lot more, but mine still tasted good and was big enough to put the vanilla creme and whip cream in.
I cut off the top of the cake, then pressed down some of the insides so that I could fit the vanilla creme inside the trenches then piped the whipped heavy cream on top of that and put the 'lid' back on. Before I put the 'lid' back on I cut them into about 1 inch pieces so that when you put it back on and want to cut the pieces, you wont press on the whip cream and have it come out the sides. So you cut it up into about 12 pieces and put the pieces back on top and when you go to cut it it still looks beautiful.
With the cream puffs I finally got the insertion of the whipping cream right. The last time I made cream puffs they were pretty big and so when I tried to pipe the cream in the side it only filled up a little because of the air pockets. This time I made smaller ones and used chopsticks to poke a hole in the bottom then kind of made room in the cream puff for the cream, then piped it in. So it filled up all the way and wasn't only in a small air pocket.
Pate a choux
(cannot be doubled)
Ingredients
1⁄2 cup (120 ml) (115 gm) (4 oz) butter
1 cup (240 ml) water
1⁄4 teaspoon (11⁄2 gm) salt
1 cup (240 ml) (140 gm) (5 oz) all-purpose flour
4 large eggs
Directions:
1. Line at least two baking sheets with silicone mats or parchment paper, or grease pans well.
2. Preheat oven to moderately hot 375°F/190°C/gas mark 5 .
3. In a small saucepot, combine butter, water, and salt. Heat over until butter melts, then remove from stove.
4. Add flour all at once and beat, beat, beat the mixture until the dough pulls away from the sides of the pot.
5. Add one egg, and beat until well combined. Add remaining eggs individually, beating vigorously after each addition. Resulting mixture should be somewhat glossy, very smooth, and somewhat thick.
6. Using a 1⁄4” (6 mm) tip on a pastry bag, pipe out about 36 swan heads. You’re aiming for something between a numeral 2 and a question mark, with a little beak if you’re skilled and/or lucky.
7. Remove the tip from the bag and pipe out 36 swan bodies. These will be about 1.5” (40 mm) long, and about 1” (25 mm) wide. One end should be a bit narrower than the other.
8. Bake the heads and bodies until golden and puffy. This is usually around 20-25 minutes, it all depends on how big you make the pastries. The heads will be done a few minutes before the bodies, so keep a close eye on the baking process.
9. Remove the pastries to a cooling rack, and let cool completely before filling.
Video for the Paris-Brest cake: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eeRQA6cNLR0
- Though I would also follow his Pate a Choux recipe because this recipe didn't puff up like his did. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QOb_d-2o5Vw&feature=relmfu
Your Paris Brest is beautiful. That filling looks so light and calorie free :)
ReplyDeleteUsing chopsticks for the cream puffs is a great idea that I am going to try.
Nice challenge!!