Tag: choux pastry recipe

Of puffs and stuffs.

Had a major meltdown a couple of days ago. I was basically in tears about every 20minutes over the stupidest things. Poor Gareth, he suffered most all of the brunt, of course.

Sometimes I think right, I consider myself pretty damn easy to get along actually….so I really can’t imagine what those women who are super dramatic in public are like behind closed doors? Patient spouses/bfs I salute you all. How do you guys do it?

I have now calmed down of course. The painters have arrived (finally!) and I am no longer a bundle of crazy & tears. Thank goodness this shit does go away!

I am sweet as a freaking jar of sugar right now compared to two days ago. Even I like myself.

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Anyway, we have started giving out our wedding invitations. Shah, my amazing blog manager is the very first one to receive it :)

# -Shah with our bigass wedding invite. Wheeeee!

I can’t wait to give out the rest! The card sets the tone of our wedding, which I will talk about soon.

Actually, truth is I don’t really have the right words to describe the theme yet lol. A bit schizo but in a crazy good way! Like us!

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One of my favourite desserts in the entire world is berrilicious chocolate pavlova from Delicious. I eat too many of them, too many but NO REGRETS!

The perfect ratio of crispy chocolate meringues with thick chocolate shavings, fresh strawberries and real cream. ohmaigerddddd

I tried making it but my last attempt at chocolate meringue literally fell flat. Best to leave this sort of things to the professionals eh.

Anyway where am I trying to get at? Back to my meltdown a couple of days back, so I tried to fix the emo with a dessert. Went to Delicious 1U.

Ordered berrilicious chocolate pavlova. Enjoyed every single spoon of it and then….cream ran out. Trust me when I say it has to be eaten with every element together.

I got a bit upset (naturally) because normally they have a lot of cream but this particular day it was barely enough.

Gareth coaxed me to ask for more cream. I was so sure they wouldn’t give me but what do you know, they gave me more than enough! No questions asked, and with a really nice smile too :)

I was so happy coz they really made my day. In the end I wondered if they would give me more chocolate meringue and strawberries for my now extra cream if I asked.

Kidding, I didn’t go there.

# – The cream that broke my emo.

Thank you Delicious 1U.

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We have finally bought our marital bedsheets for the wedding.

Went for our regular 650 thread count in red. Pillow cases also red!

# – Red for luck.

By the way, if you want to get good sheets for extra thick king size mattress, go Home’s Harmony.

Good discounts and even more as member. Service is also above average.

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I made cream patisserie for the first time! Wonder what took me so long!? Those stuff are delicious!!

Stuffed them in choux buns (recipe for the choux pastry here) I haphazardly whipped up and voila, CREAM PUFFS!

Will blog it when I make more next time. I think the secret is in using vanilla beans instead of fake vanilla extract. Makes all the difference.

# – My very inconsistently shaped but very consistently delicious homemade creampuffs.

Have a good week peeps!

I made profiteroles and they FINALLY rose!

You know what? I did it! I freakin’ did it!

Ladies & gentlemen, I successfully made profiteroles! You may have read about my failed attempt at making profiteroles and since, I had attempted two more times and failed :(

# – Crispy, creamy, chocolatey profiteroles. Woohoo!

However, last night, the time felt right. It was late, yes it was 12.30am in the morning and I thought to myself, “Hey Kimberly, I feel like some profiteroles and I have a feeling the choux pastry will puff up this time”. And so, I decided to make them, eventhough I was supposed to be already in bed.

And boy, did they puff! I was so overwhelmed with joy, I did a dance and screamed joy in my kitchen. The BF thought I had gone nuts, but then he too saw the puffed up pastry in the oven and subsequently joined in my awesome dance.

I think the success of this attempt had to do with me implementing a tip I had picked up from Masterchef Australia where the challenge in that particular episode was to make Croquembouche, a complex dessert that can be summarised as a tower of profiteroles bound together by caramel.

During the making of the choux pastry, the Masterchef’s voiceover was saying that the choux pastry of one of the contestants did not rise because she did not cook the flour thoroughly. So this time, I made sure I cooked the flour mixture through. You probably have no idea what I’m rambling about, so lets just go straight into the step by step :D

The ingredients:

  • 65 grams of flour, sifted twice
  • A pinch of salt, sifted twice
  • 150 ml of water
  • 50 grams of butter
  • 2 eggs, well beaten

For serving:

  • 100 ml of whipping cream, whipped till double in size
  • Chocolate sauce (you can buy or make yours but watch out for tomorrow’s post for my homemade version with rum!)

# – First of all, sift the flour and salt twice and set aside in a bowl.

# – Then melt the butter in water in a pot on low heat.

# – When butter have thoroughly melted, turn the heat up a little to get to a gentle boil. Most recipes would ask you to remove the butter mixture from heat at this point, but please don’t. Now, dump in the flour and salt mixture.

# – Turn the heat back down and stir and stir and stir and stir.

# – Stir till everything sticks together and forms a soft ball. Then continue stirring over the low heat for about 5 minutes more. Yes, this is the part about cooking the flour through I was talking about.

# – Now dump the dough into a mixing bowl to cool down for about 15 minutes.

# – In a pitcher, beat 2 eggs well.

# – Gently pour the egg into the dough while you’re beating it with an electrical mixer. Beat till everything is combined and form a soft peak.

# – What’s a soft peak? This is soft peak, where the dough sticks to a spoon and very, very slowly droops downwards.

# – Now, stick the dough into a piping bag. Of course, you can use a makeshift piping bag with a freezer bag, just nip the corner off and voila!

# – Pipe the dough into half of your desired profiterole size onto a greased baking tray, because when cooked they’re going to double in size!

# – Dip you hand into a bowl of water and lightly sprinkle water all over the tray, like this. This is another way to help the choux pastry rise.

# – Stick it in a preheated oven at 200 degrees celcius for 20 minutes.

# – Watch them puff up. You may now do a dance.

# – As you can see, I made some eclair shapes too so yes, I made eclairs too with this batch…hehehehe.

# – Immediately after you take the pastry out from the oven, use the skewer to poke a hole through the under of each pastry. This is to release any pressure built up inside.

# – Split each pastry into half with a knife.

# – When they’ve cooled down completely, stuff each with as much chilled whipped cream as much as you can :D

# – Lay them all on a plate and drizzle generously with warmed delicious homemade chocolate rum sauce (will blog about this tomorrow).

# – Bite into a piece. And there, profiteroles, DONE!

These profiteroles were light & crispy on the outside, with a hollow inside perfect for cradling a good dollop of yummy, milky cream.

The combination of the pastry, cream and rich chocolate sauce is seriously something bordering perfection. What can I say, they were absolutely perfect. The BF and I hoovered up everything at one go, we were quite naughty really…

My apologies while I swim for a little while more in pure self-satisfaction.