Light and airy choux pastry is filled with vanilla flavoured cream and covered in a dark chocolate glaze for a classic teatime treat!
Start with these choux buns, and once you've mastered them, you can move onto making more elaborate eclairs, profiteroles and choux crowns.
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Yields:
8 serving(s)
Prep Time:
25 mins
Cook Time:
35 mins
Total Time:
1 hr
Cal/Serv:
470
Ingredients
For the choux pastry
50g
butter, cut into cubes
150ml
sparkling spring water
1Tbsp.
golden caster sugar
65g
plain flour, sifted on to a sheet of greaseproof paper
2
medium eggs, lightly beaten
For the filling
284ml
carton double cream, whipped with 1tsp vanilla extract and 1tsp caster sugar
For the topping
200g
plain chocolate, melted with 75g butter
Directions
Step 1Melt the butter with the water and caster sugar in a heavy-based pan.
Step 2Bring to the boil, turn off the heat and immediately tip in all the flour.Beat thoroughly with a wooden spoon until the mixture forms a smooth ball in the centre of the pan.
Step 3Turn the ball into a bowl and cool for 15min. Preheat the oven to 220°C (190°C fan) mark 7.Gradually whisk in the eggs a little at a time until the mixture is shiny.
Step 4Sprinkle water over a non-stick baking sheet. Put eight large spoonfuls of the mixture on to the baking sheet.
Step 5Bake for 30min until risen and golden brown. Turn off the oven. Pierce each bun. Leave in the oven for 10-15min.
Step 6Cool on a wire rack. Halve buns and fill with cream. Top with warm melted chocolate and serve.
By sprinkling your baking parchment with water, you create steam in the oven which helps the choux to rise.
Rapidly tip in all of the flour at once and beat straight away, to cook the flour evenly throughout the mixture.
Beating the flour vigorously means you ensure the crucial development of gluten, however, by ceasing to beat once the mixture comes away from the sides of the pan, you don't overdevelop the gluten which would result in tough pastry.
It's important to release the steam from inside your choux pastry, by creating a small hole, in order to allow it to dry out.
An experienced and highly skilled team of food writers, stylists and digital content producers, the Good Housekeeping Cookery Team is a close-knit squad of food obsessives. Cookery Editor Emma Franklin is our resident chilli obsessive and barbecue expert, who spends an inordinate amount of time on holidays poking round the local supermarkets seeking out new and exciting foods. Senior Cookery Writer Alice Shields is a former pastry chef and baking fanatic who loves making bread and would have peanut butter with everything if she could. Her favourite carb is pasta, and our vibrant green spaghetti is her weeknight go-to. Lover of all things savoury, Senior Cookery Writer Grace Evans can be found eating crispy corn and nocellara olives at every opportunity, and will take the cheeseboard over dessert any time (though she cannot resist a slice of tres leches cake). With a wealth of professional kitchen know-how, culinary training and years of experience between them, they are all dedicated to ensuring every Good Housekeeping recipe is the best it can be, so you can trust they’ll work (and if they don’t – we’ll have the answer for why*) every time (*90% of the time the answer is: “buy an separate oven thermometer”!).
