FFwD: Chocolate Eclairs

These were so good! I really enjoyed having Dorie hold my hand through this whole recipe. I just love how her descriptions gave me a great sense of how my various ingredients were coming together! Here are a few pictures of the process.

For the chocolate filling: whole milk, egg yolks, cornstarch, bittersweet chocolate, sugar, salt and butter.

I wisked, boiled and melted everything down into this bowl of chocolate lovelyness.

The chocolate pastry filling spent the night in the fridge and the next evening I made the pastry dough.

The flour, butter, salt, sugar, water and milk were whisked and boiled together until it looked like this:

Next, the dough was turned into the mixing bowl and the eggs were added one at a time until the dough was shiny and smooth. I spooned the dough into a plastic bag, cut off one corner and “piped” the dough into these shapes.

One pan went into the freezer for later and one pan was put in the oven to puff. Whilst the dough was baking I made the chocolate ganache using heavy cream and more bittersweet chocolate.

This is my second bowl of chocolate lovelyness!

It was time to create the assembly line.

There were smaller rounds for me;

 

and an larger batons for my husband.

They were equally delicious! I don’t consider myself much of an eclair lover, but these have changed my mind – I really was surprised at how great they were! Can’t wait to make the second pan. I am going to see if I can have the ganache a little warmer next time, I hope it will give my glaze a smoother look. While I was getting everything ready my glaze cooled and just didn’t look as pretty as the picture in the book. Eh, no matter they were good and that is what it really is all about!