You say pound, I say choux You say coulis, I say praline You say ganache, I say mousseline Pies were never my thing And I don't like brioche All I wanna do is bicycle, bicycle, bicycle ....
That’s how I imagine old Louis Durand nervously singing and whistling while strolling down the Maisons-Laffitte scenery after being inquired by Pierre Giffard to commemorate the “Paris-Brest-Paris” bicycle race he initiated back in 1891.
The filling:
The filling for the cake comes in 3 stages: Base of the filling is first cooked as a standard pastry cream, once chilled it’s enriched with softened butter to create a richer and more delicate cream, also known as mousseline cream, after which a paste made of caramelized nuts is incorporated as the base for what is now called praline mousseline cream.
Alternatively, if you’re short on time and appliances you can buy the nut paste and your cream will still come out great but I do brace you to make all the parts from scratch, especially if you plan to drizzle the praline around the inside of the choux for an extra level of richness like I did.
The paste itself can be refrigerated for at least a month and used as spread for pancakes, filling for croissants, eaten as plain or what ever your sweet caramel-nutty cravings call for at the time!
Now to start with the preparation of the mousseline cream, first take your butter out of the fridge to soften, which you probably will forget anyways, like I did.
Before taking your sauce pan, please make sure to use full fat milk, good vanilla (be it extract, paste or bean) and quality butter. It’s those few extra coins stuck deep under your couch that elevate these types of fillings from local bakery style to haute.
In order to make the mousseline cream fluffy, both the butter and pastry cream need to be around the same temperature,(So if you’re making the pastry cream ahead, take it out of the fridge 20 min prior to beating!) else they won’t emulsify well and you will see dispersed dots of butter all around your cream.
Also, the amount of butter I specified is what personally suits me the best, the more you add the firmer the texture will be, so feel free to optimize the amount. I mean, you are after all the Jacques Genin of how much butter you put in! –shoutout to chef John.
The choux pastry:
With a reputation of being considered as difficult, choux pastry can easily be mastered following the basic rules and guidelines I’ll describe below:
The first and foremost is to stick to the measurements and ingredients. Unlike some other desserts, choux pastry is not a place to test your creativity and to feel adventurous, substituting oat for wheat flour, going dairy free and whatnot.
When cooking the ingredients on the stove top, make sure to maintain medium heat as to make sure the salt and sugar completely dissolves by the time it reaches a boil. Milk boils quickly, so if you were to place on high heat, you would be left with dispersed sugar crystals throughout your dough that would make for a cracked exterior of the baked pastry.
Use high protein flour like strong bread flour or manitoba. The higher protein content will make for a crispier and thicker shell and hold it’s initial shape better. Also, sift your flour before tossing in the pan to assure no lumps form during cooking.
When the cooked dough has reached a desired smooth texture and clings away from the sides of the pot it must be cooled down slightly before adding in the eggs, that would otherwise scramble. Rather than waiting for it to chill, either keep stirring off the heat, or transfer to a stand mixer fitted with a paddle.
Once no visual steam is escaping, start adding in the eggs one at a time, adding the next egg only once the previous one is fully incorporated. This is crucial because eggs are mostly water and adding them at once may cause the dough to split, which you would need to beat for a long period of time to bring back together. Not only would this be time consuming but would build up unnecessary gluten strands and make your dough too elastic.
After all the eggs are thoroughly incorporated, check for the consistency. Dip the paddle of the stand mixer inside the batter and see if it will drop smoothly and freely. If the batter falls in a lump, or doesn’t fall at all, then it is too tight and needs to be loosened by adding more egg whites.
Use an open French star piping tip to pipe the choux into rounds, as this will minimize ugly cracks in the baked pastry shells and help keep the shape most.
Baking the choux:
It is mandatory to bake the choux one tray at a time. Choux pastry pastry rises due to steam released from the water inside the dough when put through high heat. Too many trays in the oven will make for a too humid environment, preventing your choux from drying out and becoming crisp.
Cook each batch at 180°C for 10 minutes, then lower to 150°C for another 20 minutes. Do not open the door to check the progress, because all the steam will vent through the open door making them deflate and collapse.
Once the choux is baked, take them out of the oven and poke the bottoms with a knife to release the trapped steam inside. Skip this step and they might turn soggy with no time. Place the rolls on a rack to cool.
