Eclairs

I must confess, ever since the weather has changed from constant rain to constant sunshine, I've been lazier and unmotivated to bake. And I've also been a little lazy in blogging, even though I've baked quite a few things lately.

I'd still like to post one of my latest baking adventure: eclairs! I love choux pastry whether they be my mom's homemade ones, Beard Papa's cream puffs, or the frozen mini cream puffs they sell at Costco by the tub. Choux puffs aren't hard to make, but they usually involve piping the dough, and being the lazy baker that I am, most of the time I steer clear of recipes that involve a lot of extra work! But when La Fuji Mama made cream puffs by spooning the dough instead of piping it, I was inspired to follow her footsteps.


The cream puffs turned out excellent; they tasted just like the way my mom makes them. :) Unfortunately the same can't be said for the shapes, but I didn't expect much, since I chose to skip the hassle of piping the dough. Now, for the pastry cream, I had a few different recipes to choose from, but I ended up going with this one. It was okay; I didn't find it sweet enough, and I didn't quite like the texture. I think next time I would go with another recipe for the sake of experimenting.


And eclairs would not be complete without the chocolate glaze on top, right? At this point, I was too lazy to make anything fancier than melting some chocolate chunks (it was a very hot day, and I didn't want to linger in the already warm kitchen for too long), so I did just that, haha. They were still fabulously chocolatey, so that's okay!

Choux Pastry
recipe from La Fuji Mama

1 cup water
1/2 cup butter (1 stick/114 g)
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/4 tsp salt
4 large eggs

Preheat the oven to 400ºF. Prepare the baking sheet by greasing or lining with parchment paper.

Whisk the salt and flour together in a bowl.

In a saucepan, bring the water to a boil over medium-high heat. Then add the butter, and after it has melted, add the flour mixture all at once. Stir vigorously, and cook until it forms a ball that doesn't separate.

Remove from heat and let cool slightly (~1 minute). Add the eggs one at a time, beating until smooth after each addition.

On the prepared baking sheet, pipe or spoon the dough in your desired size with about 2 inches of space in between. Bake until the puffs are golden brown and puffy (anywhere from 20-30 minutes depending on the size). Remove from the oven and cool on a metal rack.

Chocolate Macarons

Two weekends ago, I made something I'd been dying to make for a long time - Parisian macarons. (Read about the difference here) Even though macarons have been popular for a long time, I'd never heard about them until sometime last year. I made a mental note to visit some local bakeries that sell these, but I never got to try them until I went on vacation to South Korea last August. They were sold at the food section of high-end department stores, and on one of my trips to these stores I finally decided to try an assortment of flavours.


Doesn't the assortment look pretty and inviting? Unfortunately I didn't like all of the flavours, especially the more unusual fruity ones. However, I recall loving the "safe" flavours like chocolate, coffee, and orange.

Since macarons are too pricey to purchase regularly on a student budget, I decided to make my own. I know that they can be tricky to make, so I made sure to read up on the different techniques, as well as little tips that would make a difference. For my first macaron experience, I decided to choose a flavour I love, which is chocolate. (What else, really?) I found a simple and seemingly foolproof recipe on David Lebovitz's blog. I made sure I read up on lots of macaron-making tips, and I found a great post with helpful step-by-step pictures here. Also, a few months ago, I had put in a request for I Love Macarons at the public library, and the book came to me right on time. With so many resources to turn to, what could go wrong, right?

I wish I could say following instructions carefully will guarantee successful macarons! Let me present you with the pictorial evidence of my creation:



OK, that does not look so bad for a first-timer, right? I was so excited that they had feet! Actually, those macarons above were from my "good" batch, which had a chance to dry properly before I popped them in the oven. The first batch I made looked more like this:



Needless to say, that first batch was not successful, with cracks everywhere and no feet. They looked more like double chocolate cookies than macarons! I analyzed these two batches for the taste, and I noted that the edges were a little too crunchy (too long of a baking time?), but the insides had the right amount of chewiness, and the chocolate flavour was good. The ganache tasted good too, although I should have waited until it was firmer before using it. Obviously my macarons failed in the aesthetics department; I definitely need round tips (I only had star tips which were useless in this case, so I used a plastic piping bag without any tips) and I need to work on my piping skills. And I should probably let my future macarons air dry properly so I can get those pretty little pieds forming. I'm not sure if there was something wrong I did while whipping the egg whites or folding the dry ingredients in, but next time I will definitely be more careful.

Meanwhile, here is the recipe I used. I trust David Lebovitz's recipes; even though my macarons did not look pretty, you can bet that they still tasted great. I can't wait until my next macaron adventure!