Chou a la crème
Chou a la crème is a true French dish, but I don’t know if they make in France chou a la crème as we’ve known since childhood. They are known by many different names, such as profiterole (I ate them in Strasbourg), chou a la crème, etc. The history of making such pastries dates back to the 17th century.
It is a dessert, that, due to the properties of the chou pastry, bakes crispy from the outside, silky inside, and creates a large opening in the middle, which allows you to fill the pastry with various delicious fillings. The fillings can be both savory and sweet, but for us in Estonia, classic puff pastry is filled with vanilla-flavored whipped cream and curd cream and sprinkled with powdered sugar on top.
I haven’t made puff pastry for many years, and since I need to make them for a nice person’s birthday party, I did a rehearsal a few days in advance so as not to fail miserably on the right day.
Happy Birthday Marie-Ann!!
Preparation time: No more than 1 hour
Level: Not too difficult
Quantity: About 12 Chou a la crème
Ingredients:
300 ml water
85 g butter
0.5 tsp sea salt
180 g flour
4 medium eggs
For the filling:
2 packs of curd paste
400 ml whipped cream
4 tbsp sugar
1 tsp vanilla sugar
Preparation:
- Heat the water, butter, and sea salt in a heavy-bottomed saucepan until boiling.
- Add the previously weighed flour and mix until smooth.
- Reduce the heat to medium and place the saucepan on the stove, stirring constantly until the dough heats up pulls away from the sides of the saucepan, and forms a ball of dough. This heating stage is crucial for achieving a good result.
- Remove the dough from the stove, let it cool for a few minutes, and add the eggs one at a time. Quickly mix the eggs into the dough. After adding each egg, mix the dough until smooth.
- The finished dough will be beautiful, with a uniform texture and slightly shiny.
- Place the warm dough in a piping bag and pipe a ball of dough about 6-7 cm in diameter onto a baking sheet covered with baking paper. If there are any sharp peaks after placing the dough on the sheet, smooth them out with a wet finger.
- Preheat the oven to 220 degrees C, place the puff pastry in the oven, and bake for 10 minutes. Then lower the temperature to 200 degrees C and bake until the puff pastry is golden brown and dry and crispy on top.
- Turn off the oven heat slightly open the oven door and let the puff pastry cool in the oven for a few minutes.
- Remove the puff pastry from the oven and cut a slit in the side or bottom to allow steam to escape.
- When the puff pastry has cooled, whip the whipped cream with the sugar and vanilla sugar until stiff, add the curd paste and mix until smooth. If you want a drier filling, you can use less whipped cream or regular curd. A lighter and more liquid cream is undoubtedly tastier, but eaters should be careful with their clothes and faces. After eating, it may look like for everyone that someone has eaten Chou a la crème.
- Cut the puff pastry almost in half in the middle so that you can open it and spoon in the filling, or make a hole in the bottom and fill the puff pastry with the filling through this hole.
- Serve immediately after filling so that the filling does not have time to soften the puff pastry.
- Before serving, sprinkle with powdered sugar.
Ready!!
