Cream Puffs

I've almost made it to the end.  Actually this is technically the end of the Alton Brown book - Pate a choux; otherwise known as cream puffs.  I've wanted to try this recipe for a very long time and I was so excited when I first read through this book and found it at the end.  It is the very last recipe.  I don't know why, but cream puffs are so fascinating.  They just seem like a little bit of magic I guess.  I was nervous, not going to lie, when I dove into this.  I didn't want to be the one who couldn't get the dough to "puff up" into the little heavenly pillows they should be.  So I set out on my quest with the utmost care, getting all of my supplies ready to go before I began.  I had it in my head that it was a timing thing and if I didn't have something ready it all might fail.  It didn't work that way, but it's always better to be prepared anyway. 

Making the dough begins a lot like making gravy - except the goal of a good gravy is to be without lumps - this was to get it to all form one big lump!  Goal one, complete.

 

On the cooking shows I've watched where they have made this - I've only seen everyone mix in the eggs by hand with a wooden spoon.  I was very happy to see that Mr. Brown suggested using the stand mixer; whew!

 

 

I mixed them one at a time and came up with a nice, smooth consistency.  Then put it into a pastry bag.  Next time I might try a larger tip, but it all seemed to work ok.

 

 

Ok, so a cream puff is actually a bit bigger and these would technically be considered profiteroles but who's really worried about that.  If I would have piped them out in lines I would have gotten eclairs :)

 

Since it is the steam within the dough that creates the "magic" I knew better than to open the oven door to check on the progress while these little guys baked.  But I wanted to so bad!  I kept looking through the glass but I couldn't tell if they were setting up so they wouldn't all fall once the timer went off and I did open the door.

 

But - yea! it worked!!

 

 

 

I'm so excited!  I have a party coming up and these are definitely going to be showing up on the dessert table!  I didn't have any pastry cream ready to go (and I'll be making some for sure) but I did have some chocolate butter cream and it made for a very nice substitute in a pinch.  The only bad side to any of these little guys is that they are so light and fluffy you can really throw a few back before you realize how many you've had.  Reminds me of the "Happy Days" episode where Ritchie was only drinking those tiny little glasses - 72 of them :)  Good thing I didn't go quite that crazy!

 

As I said in the beginning, this is the last recipe in "I'm just here for more food" but I still have several recipes to go back to because I didn't have the right pans (souffle) or I had a need to make something that was coming up so I just moved along.  So I'll be tying up some of those loose ends, but there aren't too many.  I'm almost done - I can feel the knowlege, it's starting to get a little crowded in the gray matter.  I'm loving it!