Éclairs… does it sound French? Well, it actually is. An eclair is a yummy French dessert, a combination of crispy pastry made with choux dough filled with vanilla, chocolate, or coffee flavored pastry cream. Choux pastry, or ‘pâte à choux’ is a light pastry dough used to make eclairs or profiteroles. For topping there are many variations, chocolate ganache is the simplest one.
You can find online a lot of recipes for eclairs. I’ve chosen an easy eclairs recipe by JamilaCuisine. Well, I must admit the trickiest part in this recipe is getting the choux pastry right. Even if the recipe is quite easy, you need to pay attention to all the steps, otherwise something may get wrong.
Anyway, eclairs are worth all effort and once you know how to make choux, you can go on and experiment with any sorts of fillings and toppings.
INGREDIENTS
For the choux pastry:
- 150g flour
- 125ml milk
- 125ml water
- 100g butter
- 4 large eggs
- a pinch of salt
For the pastry cream:
- 500ml milk
- 100g sugar
- 60g flour
- 3 eggs
- vanilla extract
- 100g heavy cream
For the chocolate glaze:
- 100g chocolate
- 100ml cream
STEPS
Preheat oven to 200°C and grease a baking sheet.
Add water, milk, butter and salt to a medium saucepan over a medium heat and stir until butter melts completely.
Add the flour and stir vigorously with a spatula or wooden spoon until the dough comes away from the sides of the pan and forms a stiff ball. It took me about 4 min. This step is very important because the dough loses water as you stir.
Now you can transfer your dough to an electric mixer and beat at low speed to release the steam (about 1 min). Add eggs, one at a time, beating very well so they are incorporated completely.
Transfer the dough in a pastry bag fitted with a large plain tip and pipe straight lines of the choux on the baking sheet.
Bake the choux for 10min at 200°C without opening the oven door and then reduce heat to 180°C. Bake for more 15-20 min until the shells are light brown and then take out of oven to make a whole into each choux to allow the steam out.
Now, return to oven for another 10-15 minutes to dry out. Remove from the oven and let cool completely.
It’s time for pastry cream now
Mix together sugar, eggs and flour. Put the milk in a saucepan over a medium heat and bring to a boil. Then, add the egg mixture to hot milk whisking constantly until the cream becomes thick. At the end stir in vanilla extract. Cool the cream at room temperature and cover immediately with a plastic wrap to prevent crust forming. When it’s cool, refrigerate until firm. Before assembling the eclairs, put the cream in your stand mixer and beat at medium speed adding slowly the whipping cream. They say it’s an additional step that you could skip. But I find it necessary in order to get a fluffy, smooth cream.
Now, split the pastry shells in half and fill the bottom half with the cream.
For the top, I used chocolate ganache which is so easy to make following some simple steps. You can decorate eclairs tops as I did or simply dip them in the chocolate glaze. I used milk chocolate as this what I found in my cupboard.
I suggest you to try this easy eclairs recipe as it’s a true delight and worth all the effort.
