Puffs Not the Ring - Tuesdays with Dorie

First, let me introduce you to the loveliest little cream puff of them all, Phoebe (also known as "The Princess Fluffy"). She was featured in one of my early blogs but she wasn't really on stage like now. As for the Cream Puffs I baked, I don't believe what I did this morning! I took photographs of a nicely risen, cute cream puff, filled with pastry cream and topped with Dorie's "Chocolate Ganache Glaze" but forgot to put the camera chip back in my camera. So no pastry photo this week - Boo Hoo!!

This was my first Choux Pastry adventure and the first time I have ever used a pastry bag and tips. It was all very exciting and satisfying at the end of the day but there were a few trip-ups along the way. My chocolate pastry cream from Dorie's book just wouldn't set so I ended up ditching it and using another recipe for vanilla pastry cream. That one came out fine. I'm going to use the pastry cream method used by Judy of Judy's Gross Eats next time, with Dorie's ingredients - sounds really easy.

Then my first batch of puffs (I was too nervous about the choux pastry challenge to try the ring) came out really small and looked like snails, so I tried again and this time I piped them much bigger, about four coils. Using a pastry bag was great fun. I left them to bake at 400 degrees F for 30 minutes without looking in the oven - what a delight when I checked them out - there they were, glistening, a nice pale honey color and really fat and puffed up. I did the drying out thing with the oven door kept ajar with a wooden spoon for about 10 minutes, then put these cuties out to cool.In the morning I filled them with the pastry cream and drizzled them with the chocolate and believed I had taken a photo.

My office pals were very impressed; I mean, how French. There were 15 puffs to start with - a few people had two each, so only one lonely little one remained in the fridge when I left for home. Thank you so much Caroline of A Consuming Passion for this great pick.