→ How to make choux pastry for eclairs. Recipe for homemade eclairs with photos. For choux pastry you will need

How to make choux pastry for eclairs. Recipe for homemade eclairs with photos. For choux pastry you will need

Choux pastry for eclairs can be prepared in different ways. In this article we will present several accessible and simple recipes with which you can make your own delicious base for sweet cakes or savory snacks.

How to prepare choux pastry for eclairs? (recipe step by step)

To make delicious and sweet cakes for a festive or simple dinner table, you don’t need a lot of expensive products and free time.

So, for the choux pastry we will need the following components:

  • filtered, settled water - a full glass
  • high-grade flour - a full glass;
  • country eggs (total weight about 250 g) - 5 pcs.;
  • not too coarse iodized salt - ½ dessert spoon;
  • unsalted butter as fresh as possible - about 100 g.

Kneading the base on the stove

Choux pastry for eclairs has its name for a reason. After all, in order to mix it, all the ingredients must be boiled on the stove for some time. To do this, you need to put a saucepan with a thick bottom on low heat, and then pour the settled water into it, add the butter and add iodized salt. Next, wait until the cooking fat has completely melted and boil all the ingredients for three minutes.

After all the described actions have been carried out, it is necessary to pour high-grade flour into the bubbling oily liquid and mix it thoroughly with a large spoon. As a result of this, you should get a soft base of uniform consistency.

The final stage in preparing the choux pastry

After thermally treating the choux pastry for eclairs on the stove, it should be removed from the heat and then cooled to 60-70 degrees. This is necessary so that after adding chicken country eggs they do not curl, but are evenly distributed throughout the base.

You can check the temperature of the dough using a thermometer or simply by dipping your finger into it. If you are not very hot, then you can safely add country eggs. Moreover, it is recommended to introduce this ingredient not immediately, but one by one.

Thus, having broken one egg into the dough, it must be mixed with a spoon so that it is completely distributed throughout the dough. Next you should enter the second, third and fourth. Before laying out the fifth egg, you need to pay attention to the consistency of the base. If it is too liquid, then you should not add the mentioned product. If the choux pastry for eclairs remains thick, then you need to add an egg.

After thoroughly mixing all the components, you should have a fairly viscous base.

The process of forming custard products

After the choux pastry for eclairs, photos of which you can see in this article, is well mixed, you can safely begin to shape the products. To do this, you need to take a large sheet, line it with baking paper, and then lay out the base using a regular tablespoon. At the same time, it is not necessary to ensure that you get identical and even balls. After all, under the influence of heat treatment, they will still rise and become beautiful.

Baking eclairs in the oven

The presented recipe for choux pastry for eclairs can be used not only to make delicious and beautiful cakes, but also to prepare aromatic snacks.

Having formed the products, the baking sheet should be immediately placed in the preheated oven. It is recommended to bake them for 25-30 minutes at a temperature of 180 degrees. It should be noted that during such heat treatment it is extremely undesirable to open the oven lid. If you neglect this advice, then all the products may simply settle and remain dull inside.

After the dough has been baked properly, it must be carefully removed from the baking paper and cooled completely. In the future, the products should be used for their intended purpose.

Choux pastry for eclairs: cooking at home together

We talked above about how to make such a base on a kitchen stove. However, you can cook eclairs in a slow cooker. For this we need:

  • settled, filtered water - 180 ml;
  • high-grade flour - 230 g;
  • large village eggs - 4 pcs.;
  • not too coarse iodized salt - ½ small spoon;
  • unsalted butter as fresh as possible - about 80 g.

Preparing custard base in a slow cooker

Eclairs made from choux pastry always turn out very tender and tasty. To make these cakes, you don't have to put in much effort. After all, they are prepared quite easily and simply.

The principle of creating choux pastry in a multicooker is almost the same as presented above. But if you don’t know how to operate such a device, we’ll tell you about it right now.

So, pour all the filtered water into the multicooker bowl, add salt and add the freshest possible butter. After turning on the baking mode, you need to wait until the cooking fat has melted and all the products have boiled. Next, add light flour to the seething oily mass and mix everything thoroughly until a homogeneous lump is formed. It should be transferred to a deep bowl and left aside for a while.

After the base has cooled slightly, you need to break the village eggs one by one. As a result of mixing these components, you should form a viscous mass that comes off well if you lift it with a spoon.

The process of forming and baking products in the oven

How should you properly bake choux pastry for eclairs? The slow cooker recipe does not recommend using this mentioned device. This is not due to the fact that the base will not cook well in it, but because you can only fit a few products in one container.

So, taking a large baking sheet, you need to line it with baking paper. Next, you need to take the viscous choux dough into a culinary syringe and squeeze it out in the form of a thick strip 8-10 centimeters long.

Having formed the eclairs, they should be placed in the oven, which must be preheated to a temperature of 180 degrees. The dough needs to be baked for about half an hour. During this time it should rise well and lightly brown.

How to use baked goods in cooking?

As mentioned above, choux pastry eclairs can be used to make delicious sweet cakes and savory snacks.

For the first course, it is advisable to use oblong products, which must be slightly cut in the side. Through the resulting hole, you can introduce any cream into the eclair using a culinary syringe. So, an ideal option would be a protein or custard filling, which is very often used to prepare various cakes.

After all the cakes are properly formed, they must be decorated using powdered sugar, icing made from cocoa powder or melted chocolate. It is recommended to serve the finished cakes to the table with tea.

As for salty snacks, it is better to take spherical baked goods for them. They should be cut in half so that you end up with some kind of baskets. In the future, they can be filled with black or red caviar, crab stick salad, mayonnaise mixed with garlic, cheese and herbs and other ingredients.

Let's sum it up

Now you know how you can make your own choux pastry using simple and very affordable products. As you dare to note, there is nothing complicated about this.

Thus, if you want to make a delicious dessert or a hearty snack at home, then you can safely use one of the above recipes.

Eclairs and profiteroles are small confectionery shops choux pastry products that appeared in French cuisine. This is the only thing that unites them.

There are many more differences between eclairs and profiteroles than similarities.

Profiteroles appeared earlier, let's start with them. The French word profitrole means benefit, value, successful acquisition. Perhaps because you can bake a whole mountain of beautiful round cakes from a small amount of ingredients, or maybe because it’s always nice to receive such a cute, tasty treat as a gift. Profiteroles can be completely different. With meat, mushroom, cheese or salad filling, they are served with broth or as a pre-dinner snack. In Burgundy they are called gougeres profiteroles (Gougeres). Profiteroles with sweet cream, ice cream or cream act as a delicious dessert. Prefabricated desserts are made from sweet profiteroles, holding the balls together with caramel, chocolate sauce and cream. This is how they prepare a wedding cake in France - croquembouche. Profiteroles can be empty and served with soups, like pampushki with borscht.

Dough for profiteroles can be either sweet or neutral, and in combination with a sweet filling, neutral or slightly salty dough creates a surprisingly balanced taste.

Profiteroles and other products made from choux pastry initially cause surprise: why are they empty inside? In fact, preparing profiteroles and eclairs is no more difficult than making pies. The secret of their emptiness is that the dense crust traps steam inside, and it presses on the walls, increasing the volume of the cakes. Main - prepare the dough correctly.

Choux pastry for eclairs and profiteroles

Ingredients:
1 cup flour, 100 g butter, 1 cup water (milk), 4 eggs, ¼ tsp. salt.

Preparation:
Boil water with salt and oil, add flour, stir thoroughly and continue heating for 5-7 minutes. You should get a homogeneous smooth mass. Remove the dough from the heat and, when it has cooled slightly, add the eggs one at a time ( eggs should only be at room temperature - otherwise you will not get a light, homogeneous dough) while simultaneously beating the dough with a mixer. You should have a moderately liquid dough dripping from the spatula. Dough that is too liquid will quickly settle during baking, while dry dough will not rise and will become covered with cracks.
Lightly grease the baking tray and use a pastry bag to place the balls of profiteroles dough, taking into account that they will increase 3 times. You can form balls with two teaspoons, but then they will not be as smooth and even. And if you use the toothed nozzle of a pastry bag, the profiteroles will turn out very beautiful and without cracks. You can also bake profiteroles in paper muffin baskets - they will not stick together and the baking sheet will remain clean.
Bake profiteroles for 12-15 minutes at 220ºC, then 20 minutes at 190ºC. Ready-made profiteroles have a dark yellow color and large volume. Remove them from the oven, cool, and serve with soup.

Empty profiteroles can stored in the refrigerator for several days. Before the holiday, you can prepare several baking sheets, and before serving, fill them with something tasty. The easiest option is whipped cream. Cut off the top of the chilled profiteroles, fill with whipped cream from a pastry bag, cover with the cut-off lid, and sprinkle with powdered sugar. Sweet profiteroles can be coated with glaze on top.
You can fill profiteroles with ice cream, but in this case you will have to cut them in half and use a spoon, which is not very convenient with small shapes. Therefore, if you plan to fill it with ice cream, salad or pieces of fruit, prepare larger profiteroles.

If profiteroles are intended for a snack table, the choice of filling is unlimited. Experiment with your favorite products; you can use proven recipes for salads and pates.

Here are some ideas unsweetened fillings for snack profiteroles:

Red fish profiteroles filling

Finely chop the salted or smoked fish, grate the hard cheese on a medium grater, finely chop the greens, add a little softened butter.

Cheese and nut filling for profiteroles

Grate the hard cheese on a medium grater, grind the roasted walnuts finely, crush a few cloves of garlic, add sour cream to the required thickness.

Filling for profiteroles with avocado

Mash the avocado with a fork, add finely chopped chili pepper and tomato. Season with lemon juice and olive oil.

Filling for profiteroles with shrimp

Grind boiled shrimp, soft cream cheese, peeled cucumber in a blender, add lemon juice and cream.

Filling for profiteroles with ham

Cut the ham into small cubes, rub the fatty cottage cheese through a sieve, add a little mustard.
From sweet choux pastry you can make profiteroles in the form of rings. They don’t need filling – profiterole rings are wonderful on their own.

Air rings

Ingredients:
1 cup flour (250 ml), 230 ml water, 0.5 tbsp flour, 120 g butter or margarine, 4 eggs, ¼ tsp. salt, 1 tbsp. powdered sugar.

Preparation:
Boil water with salt, sugar and butter, add flour, stir thoroughly and continue heating for 5-7 minutes. Remove the dough from the heat, cool slightly and beat the dough with a mixer, adding eggs one at a time. Lightly grease a baking tray and, using a pastry bag with a smooth tube, place round or oval rings, leaving enough space between them. Bake the rings for 12-15 minutes at 220ºC, then 20 minutes at 190ºC. Sprinkle finished products with powdered sugar while hot.

Eclairs

Eclairs are exquisite descendants of profiteroles. In Russia, eclairs are better known as custard cakes. The authorship of this dessert is attributed to the famous French chef of the early 19th century - Antonin Karema. The name eclair comes from the French word éclair (lightning). Perhaps it was because of the elongated shape of these cakes, or maybe because they were eaten at lightning speed.

The airy dessert seems to have been created specifically for temptation; at the sight of it, an appetite involuntarily arises. Baking a cake at home is not difficult; it is important to know a few culinary secrets.

Unlike profiteroles eclairs are always prepared with a sweet filling .

To prepare eclairs, the choux pastry from a pastry bag with a serrated or smooth nozzle should be placed on lightly greased baking sheets. The length of the cakes is about 12 cm, and the distance between them should be at least 5 cm. Bake the eclairs in the same way as profiteroles: 12-15 minutes at a temperature of 220ºC, then 20 minutes at a temperature of 190ºC. We won't repeat eclair dough recipe– it is absolutely the same as for profiteroles. Let's talk better about the filling and decoration. Typically, eclairs (choux pastries) are prepared with butter, custard or Charlotte cream, and the surface is glazed with white or chocolate glaze.

To fill the eclair with filling, use a pastry bag with a narrow tube. If you cannot fill the cake evenly on one side, you can make punctures on both sides.

Butter cream

Ingredients:
100 g heavy cream (35%), 10 g powdered sugar, a pinch of vanillin (gelatin optional).

Preparation:
Beat the chilled cream with a mixer until it forms a fluffy, stable mass. Beat slowly for 2-3 minutes at first, then increase the speed. Gradually add powdered sugar and vanilla. Beating duration is at least 15 minutes. The resulting cream is unstable and cannot be prepared in advance. To stabilize the cream, you can add soaked gelatin to the cream before whipping in a ratio of 1:10.

Custard

Ingredients:
300 g sugar, 100 g water, 150 g egg whites, 10 g vanilla powder.

Preparation:
Bring the water and sugar to a boil and boil the syrup to medium thickness. Beat the whites until stiff and increase in volume by 5-6 times. Gradually pour hot syrup into the whites, whisking continuously. Add vanilla powder and beat for another 10-15 minutes to set the cream. Properly prepared custard is snow-white, fluffy, glossy, slightly viscous. Lumps in the cream indicate rapid pouring of syrup or insufficient stirring.

Cream "Charlotte"

Ingredients:
200 g butter, 150 g sugar, 100 ml milk, 1 egg, vanillin, cognac - to taste.

Preparation:
Boil milk with sugar. Beat the egg thoroughly, pour milk into it in a thin stream (if you pour milk in immediately, the eggs will curdle). Place the resulting mass in a water bath and cook until thickened. Cool for about 10 minutes. At this time, beat the softened butter with a mixer, add vanillin, cognac and gradually pour in the egg-milk mixture. Beat the cream for another 10 minutes. The result should be a homogeneous, fluffy mass of pale yellow color that retains its shape well.
If you add a tablespoon of cocoa powder at the end of whipping the cream, you get a chocolate “Charlotte”; a teaspoon of fresh strong coffee or coffee syrup will give coffee “Charlotte”; 50 g of chopped roasted nuts will give a nutty “Charlotte”; and 100 g of fruit jam will turn the cream into a fruity “Charlotte”.

Eclairs with curd cream

This recipe is not as familiar to us as eclairs with custard and glaze, but it’s worth making! Unrealistically delicious curd cream, fresh fruit and weightless dough. Believe me, this cake will become your favorite.

The dough used is unleavened choux - see the recipe above. For the cream we need: 150 g butter, 300 grams cottage cheese, 150 grams powdered sugar, a handful of raisins. And fruits - kiwi, strawberries and grapes - for decoration.

Grind the cottage cheese thoroughly through a sieve. Separately, beat the butter and powder and add cottage cheese, vanilla sugar and steamed raisins. The cream is ready. Now we form the boats. We cut the eclair lengthwise, fill the lower part with cream, and turn the upper part of the dough upside down and put pieces of fruit into it.

White icing for eclairs

Ingredients:
2 egg whites, 100 g of powdered sugar, a few drops of lemon juice.

Preparation:
Pour the whites into a perfectly clean bowl without traces of yolk, beat them with a mixer on low speed. Gradually add powdered sugar. When the desired consistency is reached, add lemon juice. Decorate the cakes with icing by pipetting it from a pastry bag.

Chocolate icing for eclairs

Ingredients:
100 g powdered sugar, 2 tsp. cocoa powder, 4 tsp. water or milk.

Preparation:
Pour boiling water or milk over cocoa. Add powdered sugar and stir immediately. The glaze prepared according to this recipe hardens very quickly and becomes covered with a sugar crust, so apply it to the cakes immediately. To slow down the hardening and get a glossy shine to the glaze, you can add a little vegetable or melted butter.

Eclairs and profiteroles are not at all difficult if you have patience, the freshest products and the necessary equipment. Feel free to experiment and you will succeed. The ability to cook eclairs and profiteroles will immediately raise you to several levels of culinary skill. The admiration of others is guaranteed!

Secrets of making successful eclairs and profiteroles

The ease of making eclairs seems false. In fact, the recipe requires compliance with many rules.

1. Do not exceed the quantity or weight of the specified ingredients, which may cause the dough to be liquid or stiff. And also - leave a pan of dough on the stove unattended.

2. The butter should melt as the water boils.

3. All ingredients must be mixed thoroughly.

4. If desired, water can be replaced with milk, and instead of, for example, 4 eggs, use 2 eggs and 2 whites.

5. The process of preparing eclairs and profiteroles should not be interrupted, as this may cause the dough to fall off. By the way, this dough does not contain any baking powder. The dough must be baked while it is warm.

6. It is important to strictly observe the baking temperature and time.

And:

It is important! EGGS need to be taken ONLY category 1, they weigh 50 grams. If you take the 2nd one, then instead of, say, 4 eggs according to the recipe, you need to take 5. (look below for the recipe from Alexander Seleznev - there are valuable tips)

Cakes should be baked, dry, and golden in color. It is advisable that they cool slowly while in the oven, for about 1 hour.

In order to prepare dessert sweet eclair cakes, you must first bake choux pastry pieces. The taste of the confectionery product will depend on its tenderness and airiness. Choux pastry does not require many ingredients, it requires diligence and care.

For the dough you need to take a glass of sifted flour and water, one hundred grams of butter and 4-5 eggs. Pour a glass of water into a saucepan and bring it to a boil, add butter and gradually add flour, a pinch of salt and mix thoroughly. Reduce heat to low and lightly simmer the dough. Let it cool and add the beaten eggs one at a time, stirring constantly.

Transfer the dough into a pastry bag or syringe and place thin strips no more than one centimeter wide and 5-6 cm long on oiled parchment at a short distance from each other. Place the baking sheet in a hot oven and let the cakes rise and brown over maximum heat, then reduce the heat and finish baking over low heat. When baking, do not open the oven, otherwise the eclairs will inevitably fall and lose their shape.

Remove the finished pastry from the sheet immediately and let it cool, then carefully cut it lengthwise on one side with a sharp knife and fill it with the prepared cream. The filling for such cakes can be protein, custard or butter cream.

Custard is prepared as follows: dissolve 0.5 tablespoon of starch in two tablespoons of cold milk, add 0.5 tablespoon of flour, one yolk and half a glass of sugar. Stir the mixture and put on the fire, bring to a boil and add 0.5 cups of milk in a thin stream. Stir the cream constantly, otherwise you won’t get a homogeneous, even mass. After the mixture has cooled, add one hundred grams of butter and beat well. Fill custard cakes with this cream. Cover the top of the eclairs with chocolate glaze, sprinkle with powdered sugar or decorate with fruit, jelly, or meringue.

This is interesting

The calorie content of one eclair cake weighing one hundred grams with butter custard is 330 kcal. It’s worth eating five of these cakes a day to completely cover your daily ration. For those who are not used to counting calories, this hedonistic dessert will satisfy your sweet tooth from the very first bite.

The word “éclair” has another meaning - it is the name given to a special method of shooting animated films, rotoscoping. In this case, a cartoon is created using a computer by drawing frame by frame of a real film with actors and scenery. First, a film is shot, then each figure is transferred to tracing paper and an animated film is created, similar to a feature film.

Confectioners joke that if you succeed in making real fluffy eclairs the first time, you can consider that you have passed the first academic level in cooking.

Russians, as you know, know how to “brew porridge,” and the French know how to make dough. Eclairs are baked from choux pastry and have an oblong shape, while “dough brothers” - profiteroles - have a round shape.

The author of the eclair is considered to be the famous pastry chef Marie-Antoine Carême (1784-1833), who, according to all the legends, served for many powerful people, including the Russian Emperor Alexander 1. Moreover, this pastry chef is considered the founder of the St. Petersburg culinary school. It is interesting that Karem had a teacher - pastry chef Jean Avis. And he created the “shu” bun - choux, that is, “nut”. And again there was a flight of fancy, an interpretation of the “pate a choux” bun, which was potato. Experts say that the pastry chef replaced mashed potatoes with flour, which was brewed in a special way, and left eggs in the recipe. His student worked out the recipe and brought it to perfection. We still use this recipe today.

But what about the fact that choux pastry, called “choux” by the French, was invented quite a long time ago - in 1540 - by the cook of Catherine de Medici, who in 1533 married the Duke of Orleans. By the way, the Queen of France and the mother of three kings is also famous for the innovations introduced into French cooking. Arriving in France, she brought her chefs with her. One of them, a pastry chef and chef, was named Panterelli, and he was a Florentine. The culinary masterpiece, which, without a doubt, is the dough recipe, began to be called pâte à Panterelli. Later the name changed a little and sounded like pâte à Popelin, and the popelins products themselves had the shape of a flat cake. But with a nuance and not the simplest: they were shaped like female breasts.

By the way, Italians, or rather Neapolitans, also claim to be the author of choux pastry and the very fact of its appearance in very ancient times. The Florentines argue with them, who, as we understand, have every right.

M.A. Karem presented only a wonderful interpretation of the dough and suggested trying eclairs. But everything is correct: the shape and filling of choux pastry products change their official names. For example, profiteroles, small round cakes made from choux pastry. Their name was very pleasant - it was translated from French as “small monetary reward.” If the filling is whipped cream, and light powdered sugar falls on top like snow, then this is a Chantilly cake. If one nut-shaped cake covers a second, smaller one, and they are drizzled with pink sugar icing, then it is Pomme d'Amour - “Apple of Love”. What if the recipe and decor change? Then this is not the “Apple of Love”, but a cake with a completely opposite name - La Religiuse, that is, “The Nun”. Parisian pastry shops surprise you with these cakes and how wonderful the nuances of taste and decoration are: anise, violet, mango, orange blossom, caramel. An open-faced cake filled with custard and candied almonds is Zeppola di San Giuseppe.

If profiteroles filled with custard are assembled into a pyramid and covered with caramel, then we have a Croquembouche cake. You can bake a ring from the choux pastry, cut it in half and fill it with curd cream, an eclair will not work, but a choux ring with cottage cheese will be delicious. I remember that in Soviet times, custard cakes in the shape of swans were fashionable, especially on anniversaries; the number of sweet birds symbolized the number of years lived. To do this, they had to bake their long necks separately and form wings and a tail from an oval-shaped eclair.

The best eclair recipe from Julia Vysotskaya

Ingredients:

150 g flour
100 g butter
50 g powdered sugar
3−4 eggs
2 yolks
25 g corn flour
250 ml milk
1 vanilla pod
1 tbsp. spoon of sugar
1 teaspoon sea salt

Cooking process:

1 Preheat the oven to 180°C.
2 Sift the flour.
3 Combine butter, salt, sugar and a glass of water in a small saucepan and bring to a boil over low heat. As soon as the liquid boils, remove from heat.
4 Add the flour, stirring very vigorously, and then leave to cool for 2-3 minutes.
5 Add three eggs one at a time. If the consistency turns out to be too thick, add another one. The dough should be smooth and shiny.
6 Place the dough in the form of balls with a spoon on a baking sheet at a distance of 2-3 cm from each other (you can use a pastry syringe and squeeze out “correct” long eclairs).
7 Bake for 20-25 minutes without opening the oven, then reduce the temperature to 160°C and leave in the oven for another 15 minutes.
8 Prepare the cream: whisk the powdered sugar, yolks and corn flour. Cut the vanilla pod lengthwise and remove the seeds; add the grains and the pod itself to the milk and bring to a boil. Then pour the milk into the yolk mixture and very quickly return everything to the fire. Stirring constantly, bring to a boil and then rub through a sieve. Cool the resulting mass.
9 Remove the eclairs from the oven. Let cool and fill with cream.

Important: Do not open the oven during baking under any circumstances!

Tower of profiteroles from Alexander Seleznev

In this article we will talk about how to make homemade eclairs. Read the step-by-step recipe below. But first, a little theory. Products from are numerous. Among them, there are three types of baked goods: eclairs, profiteroles and shu. What makes them similar is their dough base. It is brewed in a special way. When baking, the dough swells due to moisture evaporation, and internal voids form. The increase in size of the product gave the name to profiteroles (profit means “profit”). And the word “eclair” is translated from French as “lightning.” Probably, the buns were given this name because they inflate very quickly. Profiteroles and eclairs are always stuffed with filling, often sweet (custard, protein, butter cream, condensed milk, chocolate). But you can find products stuffed with cottage cheese, mushrooms, and minced meat. Shu, due to its small size (up to two centimeters in diameter), is served with broths and soups without filling - like bread or crackers.

Dough for eclairs at home: preliminary steps

Even a novice cook can make it. An important condition for good choux pastry is that you should never open the oven door when baking. Another key to success are eggs. They should be at room temperature. Therefore, a few hours before we start kneading the dough, we will put four eggs out of the refrigerator. Now let's start looking for two pans of suitable diameter. It is required that one can completely enter the other and be stably placed at its bottom. In this case, the small saucepan should contain all the dough. You probably already guessed that preparations are underway for a water bath. We will use this culinary technique to make eclair dough at home.

Steaming

Fill a large saucepan two-thirds full with water. Set it on fire. We immerse the smaller one in it. Water should not overflow the edges of this container. We also pour water into a small saucepan. But the quantity specified by the recipe is two hundred and fifty milliliters (a glass). Cut one hundred grams of butter into pieces. Add a pinch of salt. We wait until the heated water from the large pan melts the butter in the small one. This technique will prevent the fat from burning. The oil will come into contact with the water. Don't take out the small saucepan. Pour two hundred grams of white wheat flour into it. This is where the hard part begins. We need to mix hot oil water with flour so that not a single lump remains. This should be done with a wooden spatula. You can also use a submersible mixer. But they need to act very carefully so that the whisks do not spread splashes and flour throughout the kitchen. Numerous homemade recipes agree on one thing: the dough should be homogeneous, without lumps.

Kneading

As soon as the flour has completely combined with the oil liquid, remove the saucepan from the boiling water. Knead the dough again. We work with a wooden spatula for about five minutes. This way, firstly, the dough will cool faster, and secondly, it will become more elastic. Now it's time to beat in the eggs. We do this strictly one at a time and constantly knead the mass until completely homogeneous. Making dough for eclairs at home is not a problem, the main thing is to take your time and be patient. The mass should not be either liquid or too stiff. The dough will spread when you try to shape it, but it will also stretch slightly with the spoon. By the time the kneading is finished, the oven should already be preheated. Turn on the heat to two hundred degrees. Cover the baking sheet with parchment paper.

Planting

Now we begin to bake our eclairs (we have already mastered the dough recipe). We remember that we got ours from the ability to rapidly increase in size. Therefore, we place them on a baking sheet in such a way that in the oven the products do not stick together into a single lump. Profiteroles can be placed on parchment paper using a regular tablespoon. But eclairs should have the elongated shape of sticks ten centimeters long. Therefore, we cannot do without a pastry bag. Don't have such a device in your house? No problem: it will replace a regular durable cellophane bag. Fill it with dough. We clamp the edges. Cut off the tip at the cone. Voila! The pastry bag is ready to use. Squeeze the dough out onto kitchen paper. We form sticks five to seven centimeters long, leaving approximately the same distance between them. Place the eclairs in the oven for ten minutes. After this, reduce the temperature to one hundred and eighty degrees. Bake for another twenty minutes. Only after this is it permissible to open the oven door.

Semifinished

Thus, we got hollow buns. They should be evenly golden, dry on all sides, and when tapped, the dough should make a dull sound, indicating the presence of voids inside. These “blanks” can be stored for quite a long time - several months - in the freezer in an airtight container. In case of unexpected guests, all you have to do is prepare the cream and fill the finished eclairs with it. The dough recipe will allow it to remain fresh for several days - if you place the dough in a tightly tied bag. But in any case - whether you prepare the cakes for serving immediately, or hold them for the time being - the finished products need to be completely cooled. Because the cream, once in a hot environment, may behave unexpectedly.

Preparing the filling

Classic eclairs contain custard in their delicate cavity. But this is not a hard and fast rule. You can prepare cakes with any other filling, fill them with boiled condensed milk, jam, chocolate and nut mixture like Nutella. The ideas are countless. Let's look at the recipe for Italian meringue. This cream is so gentle, almost weightless. With meringue you will get very tasty eclairs. It is very easy to do, but you will need four hands. Mix one hundred thirty grams of sugar and forty milliliters of water. Cook the syrup until it becomes extremely thick, when caramel threads begin to trail behind the spoon. The second person at this time beats two egg whites with a mixer. The foam should be stable, but without hard peaks. Pour the syrup into the whites in a thin stream, without ceasing to work with the mixer at the same speed. When the meringue becomes dense and shiny, you can add some kind of flavoring - vanilla or essence.

Serving

Making the cream is half the battle. Now they need to stuff the hollow buns. Recipes for eclairs at home offer two options. The first one is the simplest. Cut the bun in half lengthwise and spread the eclair with cream like a sandwich. The second method requires the presence of And the cream in this case must be sufficiently elastic. Make a hole in the crust and add filling. And the final touch is the glaze. It can be chocolate, sugar, caramel. You can decorate the surface of the products with coconut, meringue or jelly.

Yulia Vysotskaya: eclairs from a culinary star

How does the famous chef suggest we make cakes? She prefers to replace water with milk. In this case, you can do without a water bath - just heat all the ingredients for the dough over low heat. We also add a little vanillin for flavor. When the dough becomes thick, remove it from the heat and, kneading constantly, add four eggs one at a time. Such buns need to be baked at two hundred and twenty degrees for the first ten minutes, and then kept at one hundred and ninety Celsius for another quarter of an hour. When creating eclairs step by step, you should pay attention to the cream. We have already said that there are many recipes for it - from classic custard to pistachio or lemon. Vysotskaya suggests making it from corn flour (25 g), three yolks and powdered sugar (fifty grams). Beat all these ingredients until white thick foam. We dilute with a glass of milk. Place on the fire and bring to a boil. We fill our eclairs with this warm cream. Delicious!

Hi guys!

Who doesn't love eclairs?? I think there are no fools. Everyone loves these ingenious custard cakes with a thin shell, airy cream and chocolate icing.

In the classic version, French eclairs are filled with custard.

And I’m still trying to remember what those iconic custard pies were sold with: it seems to me that they were mostly with Charlotte butter cream, right?

But I remember for sure that I always had too much of this filling and was too fatty. What I liked most was the shell itself. I will say even more, now I take more pleasure in “cleaning up” the dummies immediately from the baking sheet than in ready-made eclairs with filling.

Therefore, today I will suggest you to prepare a modernized and lighter version of eclairs: with mascarpone, cream and strawberries.

It tastes very similar to those Soviet custard pies, but these ones are much lighter and airier.

But the filling is a matter of taste, of course. The main thing is us Let's look at it in detail how to prepare the perfect choux pastry for eclairs, and also learn all the nuances of baking and filling eclairs.

In general, today’s article is brilliant! Here we put together the entire process of making eclairs from A to Z: starting with choux pastry and ending with two main types of coating. Meanwhile I'll give you as many as 3 filling options to choose from.

If you have symptoms of perfectionism and are looking for perfectly smooth eclairs without tears or cracks, then you need to move to the next level: with a description of all possible errors and a preparation mechanism worked out to the smallest detail.

Now eclairs, along with, are experiencing their second youth. All the pastry chefs in the world compete like crazy for the smoothest, hollowest and most original eclairs. How and what they are not decorated with just now.

Here are just a few examples from confectioner Tal Spiegel, who is obsessed with desserts and shoes:

So where to start?

Choux pastry recipe

First, let's write down the list of ingredients for the choux pastry. Despite its sophistication and genius, the composition of the choux pastry for eclairs is incredibly simple and short.

Required Products:

  • water - 200 ml
  • butter - 100 gr.
  • sugar - 5 gr.
  • salt - 1 pinch
  • flour - 130 gr.
  • eggs, room temperature - 210 gr. (≈4 pcs.)

Cooking method:


In the meantime, while the eclairs are cooling, I’ll tell you about mascarpone cream and give you a couple more recipes for my favorite fillings for eclairs.

3 recipes for eclair cream

Cream with mascarpone

Let's take the following products:

  • heavy cream 33-35%, cold - 200 gr.
  • mascarpone cheese, cold - 200 gr.
  • powdered sugar - 80 gr.
  • vanilla extract - 1 tsp.

additionally:

  • any fruit or berry puree - 70 gr.

Recipe:

  1. Cool the mixer bowl and beaters for 2-3 minutes. This will make the cream whip faster.
  2. Whip the cream to stiff peaks.

    Be careful not to over-whip the cream, otherwise it will separate. Stop the mixer periodically and look at the consistency: if the cream holds its shape and does not fall off, then the whipped cream is ready.

  3. Separately, thoroughly mix the mascarpone with powdered sugar and vanilla until smooth (+ fruit puree if desired).
  4. Place the cream in the mascarpone and carefully mix the two masses with a spatula using folding movements from bottom to top.

    Do not stir for too long, otherwise the cream may curdle.

  5. We transfer the finished cream into a pastry bag with the thinnest tip you have, and fill the eclairs on both sides, making holes on the sides or bottom of the eclair with the same tip or the back of a teaspoon.

If you don't want to bother with piping bags, you can just make custard "sandwiches," as my husband says. To do this, cut the eclairs lengthwise to about the middle and use a regular spoon to fill the cakes with cream.

Vanilla custard

For it we will need:

  • milk - 500 gr.
  • sugar - 120 gr.
  • natural vanilla – 1 pod or vanilla extract - 1 tsp.
  • eggs - 50 gr. (≈1 pcs.)
  • yolk - 40 gr. (≈2 pcs.)
  • corn starch - 60 gr.

additionally (for a more airy cream):

  • heavy cream 33-36%, cold - 150 gr.
  1. Pour milk into a saucepan and add ½ part of sugar (60 gr.) (Sugar will prevent the milk from burning). Cut the vanilla bean in half lengthwise and scrape out the seeds with a knife. Place the vanilla pod along with the seeds in a saucepan with milk and place it over moderate heat. Bring the milk to a boil.
  2. While the milk is heating, in a separate bowl, whisk the egg, yolks, and remaining 60 grams. sugar and starch until a homogeneous mass is formed.
  3. When the milk begins to boil, reduce the heat to low and remove the pan from the heat. Remove the vanilla stick, pour about 1/3 of the milk into the bowl with the egg mixture, stirring vigorously.
  4. Pour the resulting mixture back into the pan with milk and quickly stir with a whisk.
  5. Return the pan to low heat and cook until a thick, homogeneous cream without lumps forms. It will take 1-2 minutes, no more.
  6. After the cream has thickened, remove the pan from the heat, cover with cling film so that the film adheres closely to the surface of the cream (otherwise an unpleasant crust will form) and leave until completely cooled.
  7. Before filling the eclairs with custard, mix it well with a whisk.
  8. For a more airy version, add whipped cream to the cooled custard, after mixing it first (I described how to whip cream in the previous recipe for cream with mascarpone).

Chocolate custard for eclairs

Modern eclairs are often prepared with chocolate cream. Let's cook that too.

Ingredients:

  • custard - 500 gr. (recipe above⇑)
  • dark chocolate - 150 gr.

Preparation:

  1. Prepare the custard according to the recipe indicated above (do not add vanilla).
  2. Add finely chopped chocolate to the just prepared cream and mix thoroughly with a whisk until the chocolate is completely dissolved.
  3. Cool the chocolate cream by covering it tightly with cling film.
  4. Stir with a whisk before use.

You can also mix whipped cream into the chocolate cream, as in the previous recipe. The eclair in the next photo is filled with exactly this cream.

Glaze recipe

Previously, our glaze for eclairs was made from regular fudge sugar with cocoa. It was wonderful. When bitten, the glaze crunched slightly and had a unique grainy structure. I really liked her.

But we won’t make lipstick. With such a wide selection of quality chocolate, it is no longer relevant.

We will prepare the simplest icing from cream and chocolate.

For the glaze, prepare:

  • heavy cream, 33-36% - 100 gr.
  • dark chocolate - 100 gr.

Preparation:

  1. Bring the cream to a boil over moderate heat.
  2. Cut the chocolate into small pieces and pour in hot cream.
  3. Mix thoroughly with a spatula until a homogeneous glossy glaze is obtained.
  4. Cool the glaze slightly before applying.
  5. Dip the filled eclairs into the glaze halfway and leave to harden.

As you can see, this time I have eclairs without glaze. I decorated them on top with the same mascarpone cream as inside and added slices of strawberries and caramelized nuts.

It turned out incredibly tasty.

And finally, so that you are fully warned and armed, I will give you another, fashionable recipe for coating eclairs, called craquelin.

It is widely used by confectioners all over the world. It cooks quickly, looks impressive, and you can always have a spare in the freezer. So, here's the recipe.

Craquelin for covering eclairs

Required Products:

  • butter - 100 gr.
  • flour - 120 gr.
  • sugar (white or brown) - 120 gr.
  1. Mix all ingredients in a mixer or blender for literally 30 seconds.
  2. Quickly collect the resulting dough into a ball and roll it into a thin layer 1-2 mm thick between two sheets of parchment paper.
  3. Place the dough in the freezer for 30 minutes.
  4. Cut out rectangles from the dough corresponding to the size of the eclairs. Before baking, cover each eclair with a strip of craquelin and bake.

These eclairs no longer need to be covered with glaze; they are amazing on their own.

For the chocolate craquelin subtract 20 grams. flour and replace them with 20 gr. cocoa.

And by adding food coloring, you can get an even more interesting result))

With this I'm leaving...

Prepare your eclairs and don’t forget to share your impressions in the comments.

Thanks to all!

Good luck, love and patience.

Cut the butter into small cubes and place in a saucepan along with salt and sugar. Pour in water, put on fire, melt butter and bring to a boil.

Stirring constantly with a whisk, pour all the flour into the saucepan at once. Continue kneading vigorously until the dough begins to pull away from the sides of the pan and comes together. Transfer it to a bowl, cover with a towel and cool to a temperature of 30–35°C.

Break the eggs into a bowl and beat lightly. Begin beating the dough with an electric mixer on medium speed or in a food processor. Add eggs to the dough 1 tbsp at a time. l., continuously whisking until the dough becomes smooth and homogeneous.

Preheat the oven to 190°C. Line a baking tray with baking paper. Place the dough into a pastry bag fitted with a 10mm smooth round tip for 7cm long cakes or 20mm for 15cm long cakes. Press out the dough, keeping the tip close to the baking tray. At the end, make a sharp movement in the opposite direction to break the dough. If you get a sharp tip, smooth it with a finger moistened with water.
Place the pan in the oven and bake for 5 minutes. Then open the oven door 1 cm (to allow steam to escape) and cook for another 30 minutes. The eclairs should increase in volume and become golden.

Cut the finished eclairs lengthwise in the middle. Cool. Fill the eclairs with cream and pour over the glaze.

Grind the yolks with 3 tbsp. l. milk and starch. Pour the rest of the milk into a saucepan, add sugar and vanilla seeds and bring to a boil. Pour 1/2 cup of boiling milk into the yolks in a thin stream, stirring constantly with a whisk. Then pour the yolk cream into a saucepan with boiling milk, stirring constantly, bring to a boil. Cook for 1 minute. Cool.

 

 
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