Ingredients:
Craquelin (the crispy top of each cream puff)
30g softened unsalted butter
25g confectioners’ sugar
40g cake flour
Choux Pastry
40g unsalted butter
50g milk
50g water
2g sugar
1g salt
55g cake flour
2 eggs
Notes: By cake flour, I mean low protein flour, which normally contains 7-9% protein (Mine is around 8%). Not self-rising flour.
Filling
100g heavy cream
50g softened cream cheese
20g sugar
Some fresh fruits like blueberries, strawberries, mangos and so on.
Decoration
12 chocolate buttons
50g chocolate chips
Steps:
- In a clean bowl, put together softened unsalted butter, sugar and cake flour, and use a hand mixer to beat until well combined. Roughly shape into a ball, place it on the parchment paper, cover it with the other half of parchment paper, use a rolling pin to roll it flat about 2mm thick. Chill until set. Use a 5 cm wide ring mold to cut out some small round pieces. One for each cream puffs.
- In a non-stick pot, put in unsalted butter, milk, water, sugar and salt, let it come to a boil, turn off the heat, add in 55g cake flour, and keep mixing and stirring until well combined. Transfer the dough into a clean bowl; wait until it is cool to touch. Gradually add in 2 eggs while using a hand mixer to beat until well combined.
How to tell if dough is ready: use a spatula, scrape the dough or dip the head of a spatula into the dough and pull out to see if there is some dough hanging on the spatula's head and the shape looks like an inverted triangle flag. Then it is ready.
- Preheat the oven to 392℉(200℃). Put the dough in to a piping bag. Line the baking tray with parchment paper or baking mat. Pipe out the dough into 5 cm wide 4 cm tall round dots. Each top with one round Craquelin. Send into the oven to bake for 15 minutes; lower the heat to 338℉(170℃) and bake for another 15 minutes. Take the baked cream puffs out of the oven, and let it cool down on the cooling rack.
- In a clean bowl, melt the chocolate chips, let it cool down and put into a piping bag. Set aside.
- In a clean bowl, softened the cream cheese, use a hand mixer to beat until smooth. Add in heavy cream and sugar, beat until it forms stiff peaks. Put all the whipped cream into the piping bag, set in the fridge to keep it cool.
- When the cream puffs is cool to touch, slice off its top, pipe in a layer of cream, a layer of fresh fruits or any other fillings you like, and another layer of whipped cream until you fill the cream puffs. Pipe a dot of whipped cream as the bear’s head, draw the eyes and smile of the cute bears with melted chocolate, and use the chocolate buttons as its ears. Let the cream puffs cool in the fridge for 30 minutes before serve. This recipe can make about 6 cream puffs.
