I love baking so much … It’s so terapeutic and fun , you
can’t imagine . I love baking as much as I love any cuisine , cooking is not
all about salads and meat , it’s also about baking , pastries , patisserie .
I am a sweets fan and of course ultimately a pastry fan , but of course when we talk
about pastry we talk about a different aspect of the culinary world , a much
more difficult part .
Why is baking a difficult part of the culinary world ? Because
it’s all about mathematics and chemistry , discipline and measurement .
You can’t go freestyle on it , like in the cuisine part for
example where sometimes even ingredients that don’t go togheter , sometimes
they can with enough experience and cooking skill .
But in the patisserie world we have to be acurrate , from
measurement , to degrees , almost in every aspect . You have to be really
experienced in the pastry world as a chef to produce pastry recipes , or to
get a bit funky with the ingredients .
As a begginer I personally advice you not to get funky , and
stick to the recepy , otherwise you’ll have the surprise that the dough hasn’t
risen enough or maybe the cream ain’t thick enough , the taste is horrible or if we go into the profiterole world
, the first bunch that I made , without measurement and degrees control , were
hard as a rock .
You could literally break your head with them ( haha )
!
But on my second
attempt , thanks to the guidance of my mentor in the culinary arts ( mom ) , I
finnaly achieved some awesome results , the choux pastry was perfect , the
profiteroles have risen perfectly and they were really tasty .
The first mistake that I made was to open the oven doors and
the heat from the oven was not enough to prepare the choux pastry , thus
resulting in rock hard profiteroles .
And another mistake was not measuring the ingredients such
as flour and adding 2 much eggs perhaps , also not working the choux pastry
enough .
Anyway the most important aspect when you are baking Is to
actually find out what your mistakes were
, and keep those on track … trust me you’ll learn more from your
mistakes than from your achievments .
Keep a note on all your mistakes and also a note on how to
fix those mistakes . This is trully an important aspect as a pastry chef or ‘’ at home chef ‘’ .
So guys , I ran you through some of my mistakes , take a
note , clear your head and let’s start
baking !
The ingredients you need for this recepy are :
For the choux
pastry :
-
200 g of unsalted butter
-
200 g of flour
-
500 ml of milk ( or water , whatever you like )
-
A pinch of salt
-
5 eggs
For the
chantilly cream :
-
400 ml of heavy cream
-
1 vanilla pod or you could use vanilla extract or
something new I’ve seen on the market sugar with vanilla seeds … just don’t use
any of that vanilla essence , it’s not good and doesen’t even come close to
vanilla aroma .
-
if you are using a vanilla pod , or vanilla extract add
2 table spoons of sugar to convince it it’s a dessert , if you add sugar with
vanilla seeds do not add any sugar at all
For the
chocolate sauce :
-
200 g of dark chocolate ( 75% cocoa solids )
-
2 tablespoons of honey ( you could add more if you like
it more sweet )
-
60 g of butter
-
A pinch of salt
-
1 huge cup of milk
Preheat your oven ( to max degrees ) , Use a sauce pan or a pot whatever you preffer , add the 500 ml of milk , bring it up to a boil and add the butter , let it melt , then add the flour and styr vigorously , untill it forms a dough like consistency .
Take it off the heat and cover it with cling film and let it chill . After it chilled add 1 egg and keep styring until it bonds . Do the same with all the eggs but just remember to add them 1 by 1 .
After that put some baking paper on your baking tray , rubb some butter on it , then using a pipping bag just pipe shapes of little profiteroles . As you pipe they also form some pointy shapes at the top . Put your finger in a bit of warm water and press it down gently , otherwise that pointy shape will cook a lot faster than the whole profiterol and it will surerly burn , and no one likes burnt pastry ( bleax :D )
After you've arranged them on your tray , change the temperature of the oven to 180 degrees and bake them for aprox. 25 to 30 minutes .
For the chantilly cream just pour the heavy cream into a bowl then add your vanilla beans or vanilla sugar or extract and just whipp it with a whisk untill it gets hard .
As for the chocolate sauce .... on a bain marie just add your chopped chocolate , with a pinch of salt , 2 tablespoons of honey and 60 g of butter . Let it melt gently and styr it once in a while , then take it off the bain marie and add your milk and styr it again until it formes a sauce consistency .
When your profiteroles are ready take them out of the oven , let them chill a bit , then using a piping bag fill them inside with the chantilly cream .
Serve this little fellas with some chocolate sauce and icing sugar , they are just plainly amazing .... i just love profiteroles i could eat a thousand !!! You cand fill them with anything you like or top them with anything you like ... it's up to your prefference and style ... this is the way i like to eat them !
So here they are i hope you'll enjoy these profiteroles , what can i say the french kick ass when it comes to cooking and especially pastry !
Cute little fellas ! and they taste amazing !!
So guys until my next post i hope you enjoyed this recipe and give it a go , trust me as long as you respect everything i've wrote you nothing can go wrong , and if you don't get it right the first time ... who cares it's not the end of the world you'll get it right next time .
The importance is to try and see what you can achieve . And if you get them right , trust me you won't regret putting the effort of making them :D
Bon Appetit !
