Delicious Cream Puffs
Happy Memorial Day! We spent a wonderful weekend out on boats and at the beach. The weather could not have been more perfect, and I am now convinced that every tourist who is currently in Charleston wants to move here, so I should probably get my real estate license as opposed to my continuous attempts at baking. However, baking is clearly more fun. We are grilling out tonight, and I am going to make cream puffs for dessert. I am pretty excited about it. I know that most people just cut the puffs open and fill with pudding or custard that way, but I am going to try to fill them without cutting them in half- it will probably be a huge mess but should be fun. Because I love vanilla custard, that is with what they will be filled. I might make chocolate custard as well, but we will see how it goes.
Cream Puffs
Ingredients:
1 cup water
1/2 cup butter
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
4 large eggs
Directions:
Preheat the oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit.
In a small bowl, whisk together the flour and salt.
Bring the water to a boil in a medium-size saucepan over medium-high heat. Add the butter. When the butter has melted, add the flour mixture all at once and stir vigorously. Cook and stir until the mixture forms a ball that doesn’t separate.
Remove from the heat and cool slightly (about 1 minute). Add the eggs, one at a time, beating after each one until the dough is smooth.
Drop heaping tablespoons of dough about 2-inches apart onto a greased baking sheet. Or transfer the batter to a pastry bag with a round tip and pipe circles about 2-inches in diameter and about 1-inch apart onto greased baking sheets. Bake the puffs for about 30 minutes until they are golden brown and puffy. If the puffs are medium-size, bake for about 22 — 25 minutes, and if the puffs are mini-size, bake for about 17 — 20 minutes. Remove the cream puffs from the oven and cool on a cooling rack.
Vanilla Custard Filling
Ingredients:
2/3 cup granulated sugar
2 Tablespoons cornstarch
2 tablespoons all purpose flour
pinch of salt
4 large egg yolks or 2 whole eggs
2 cups milk
1 vanilla bean or 2 teaspoons of vanilla extract
2 Tablespoons unsalted butter
Directions:
On a piece of plastic wrap, or in a small bowl, combine the sugar, cornstarch, flour and salt. In a saucepan, combine and whisk together the egg yolks and milk, or whole eggs if you are using them.
Gather the corners of the plastic wrap, or the bowl and pick up the starch mixture, pour it on top of the eggs and milk and whisk well to be sure that all of the cornstarch and flour are dissolved. Add the vanilla bean. (if using the extract, add it at the end of the recipe.
Set the pan over moderate heat and cook the custard for about 12 minutes, until thickened and brought to a boil. To do this, stir on and off for the first 5 minutes, then stir constantly for 7 minutes longer until the cream really thickens and reaches a boil.
Remove pan from the heat. The cream is done when smooth and thick enough to leave a clearly defined line when you draw your finger through the cream coating the back of the spoon.
Remove the vanilla bean, rinse it, and set it aside to reuse. If you are using extract instead of the bean, add it now. Add the butter and whisk until melted and blended in.
Pour the cream through a sieve into a bowl. Stir in any additional flavoring if using it. To prevent a film from forming on top of the cream, press a piece of plastic wrap onto the surface. Cool cover and refrigerate until ready to use.
Now that it is finally getting warm out and hopefully staying that way, there is nothing more refreshing on a hot day than the taste of lemon. For some reason to me, the taste of lemon always seems cool. This is a great recipe for a glazed lemon bread which is really a dessert, but I think it is a treat any time- especially for breakfast.
I used to not like quiche. Most likely the reason for this is that I thought all quiche contained spinach because when my mother made quiche it was spinach quiche. I am still not a huge fan of cooked spinach- will eat it in my salad all day long. I like it fresh. Of course I have since had quiche that did not contain spinach, and it was quite tasty, but quiche is not something I ever think about making. I was at dinner last night to celebrate a friend’s birthday, and she was given a Le Creuset tarte tatin dish as a present. We were talking about all the things you could make in it, and quiche came up as an option. So, this morning, I started looking at some quiche recipes. While this one would not be made in a Le Creuset tarte tatin dish, I particularly like this easy mini quiche recipe- probably because it has a lot of cheese, and cheese is good.
For those of you who watched the Super Bowl last night- what did you think? For those of you who didn’t- it was a pretty interesting game- complete with a 35-minute delay because half of the stadium lights went out, which caused quite a momentum shift. Anyway- Ravens won- football is over til September. I am ok with all of that. What was really exciting about the weekend was that I found my new favorite appetizer. Super easy, super delicious, and looks like you spent a lot of time slaving away in the kitchen. Of course, it involves cheese because how could it be my favorite if it didn’t? All you need is a little puff pastry cups- you can buy them frozen at the grocery store, some brie cheese, and some fig preserve. Cut up the brie into little pieces small enough to fit into the pastry cups, and then add a dab of the fig preserve on top. Then bake at 350 for 10 minutes. So amazing!
