Easy Homemade Cream Puffs

Easy Homemade Cream Puffs is a French dessert that is very simple to make even though it sounds intimidating.  In this blog we’ll cover some of the techniques and how to instructions to making Homemade Cream Puffs completely from scratch.   I will also discuss some other alternatives to making them.  You can make them as homemade as you would like.  You can decide what fits your skill level and your time.

The Pastry Shell

The pastry shells of cream puffs are called Choux Pastry in French.  Choux is pronounced like “shoe”.  It’s a technic that is used to make the pastry shells.  We’ll discuss the how to instructions with that.

In a saucepan you’ll need to bring to a boil water and butter.   Once that is boiling, you’ll reduce the heat and add in the flour and the salt, mixing them well until the pastry pulls away from the sides of the pan and starts to form a ball.

Next add the eggs to the flour mixture while you are vigorously stirring them together and mixing them completely.  At first it’ll seem like the egg just will not incorporate, but all of a sudden, they will start mixing in.  It is a lot of vigorous arm work.  Repeat this until all of the eggs have been added and fully mixed together.  The pastry should look shiny and smooth when it is fully mixed together.

There are two different ways to bake them.  The traditional method is on a parchment lined baking sheet.  However, greased muffin tins would great too.  Personally, I prefer using the muffin tins.  I think they pastry shells have better shape and are nicer to fill.

If you are using a baking sheet you can drop them by tablespoons full or use a medium cookie scoop and drop onto the baking sheet or you can put the dough into a pastry bag or a resealable bag with the corner cut and pipe them onto the baking sheet.

Puff Pastry Shell shape tip:  To have nicely shaped pastry shells, put the dough in nice evenly shaped piles in the center of the muffin tin.  The dough that is circled in green puffed up to a really nicely mounded centered shape.  The dough circled in red puffed up with a hump on the lower left like Quasimodo.

They are baked in the oven until they are golden brown.  This is a tricky part.  Sometimes they will look done on the outside, but they will not be cooked enough on the inside.  If they are undercooked, they will fall in.  So, once you think the look done and are golden brown, cook them for a couple minutes more.  It is better for them to be over cooked than to be undercooked.

Once you feel they are done, turn the oven off and open the oven door with the pastry shells in the oven.  Let them rest for a few minutes as directed.  Then remove them from the oven to cool.

They can be made a day in advanced, and they will stay nice and fresh is they are kept on the counter and lightly covered.  They need to have a little bit of air to stay dryer and not get soggy.

The Pudding

Oh, this is my favorite part of a cream puff.  For me, this is the part that makes or breaks a cream puff.  But it is purely personal preference.

The milk, flour, sugar, and salt are mixed together in a saucepan and brought to a boil.  As it heats up it will start to thicken.  The boil is more of a bubble.  As it is heating up stir it often.  We’re going to very smooth and very creamy.  Reduce the heat and cook for a bit more.

We are going to temper the eggs.  This means we will warm up the eggs by adding in a little bit of the thickened milk mixture while whisking.  This will prevent the eggs from scrambling and making lumps in our pudding.  Whish your eggs and add a little bit of the thickened milk, stop adding but keep whisking.  Then repeat this until you have doubled the amount of egg mixture in your bowl.  Now we’ll reverse this and slowly add the egg mixture back into the saucepan, whisking it continuously until all of the egg mixture has been added.

Now we’ll bring it back up to a boil or a bubble.  Then remove it from the heat.

Add in the vanilla extract, vanilla beans, and the butter and mix them well.

Let is sit out to cool to room temperature.  Top with plastic wrap that you will put directly on top of the pudding.  The plastic should be touching the pudding.  This will prevent a skin or film from forming on top of the pudding.  Then you can put it int eh refrigerator to chill.  As it chills it will thicken a bit more.

It should be fully chilled before you assemble your cream puffs.

The Whipped Topping

This is a stable whipped cream.  Stable means that it will not deflate and turn runny over time.  This can be made in advanced too and assembled right before serving.  It keeps well in the refrigerator for 5-7 days.

You will use heavy whipping cream to make this.  It will be lightly sweetened and whipped to peaks, so it’ll make a pretty dollop.  It’s a combination of the powdered sugar and the cornstarch that makes this stable.  Both are critical and adjusting the amounts will affect your whipped topping.

When making the whipped topping do not leave it while the mixer is running and watch it closely, so it does not get over whipped.

Put the heavy cream into a mixing bowl and add the powdered sugar.  Whip it until soft peaks form.  Soft peaks are when you touch it with a utensil or a beater the cream make soft smooth peaks.  It doesn’t hold the shape firmly.

Once it creates soft peaks add the corn starch and the vanilla.  Turn the mixer back on.  Whip it until it has stiff peaks.  Stiff peaks is when you touch it with a utensil or a beater the cream makes stiff peaks, and it holds that shape very firmly.  Do over whip it.  It will get hard like butter, and you cannot undo that, and you will not want to use it on your cream puffs.  You’ll have sweetened butter.

Refrigerate your whipped cream in an airtight bowl.

Assembling the Cream Puffs

Slice the pastry shell in half, add the pudding, and a dollop of whipped topping.  Place the top of the pastry shell on top or sort of on top and dust with powdered sugar.  To dust with powdered sugar use a sifter and sift it on top of the cream puff shell or a mesh strainer and tap you hand on the side to put the powdered sugar on top of the pastry shell.  I added a strawberry to give it some pretty color.  Any fruit can be added or not added.

Options

I said I would review some other ideas to make your cream puffs as homemade as you would like and what fits your skill level and your time.

These have a homemade vanilla pudding.  Any pudding flavor can be use as well as any pudding.  You can use instant pudding or even pudding packs if you’d like.  It’s your dessert.  You get to decide.

These have homemade whipped topping.  You can use whipped topping from the freezer section of the grocery store.

Cream Puffs can be very versatile with the fillings.  You can really make them a lot of different ways.

Here are some different filling ideas:

1. Fresh fruit and whipped topping, like strawberries and whipped topping or mixed berries and whipped topping.
2. Chocolate or vanilla pudding and whipped topping with crushed up candy bar pieces on top of the whipped topping.  Peanut butter cups, snickers, or plain chocolate shavings.
3. Maybe you mix pudding with whipped cream and pipe that inside the cream puffs.  It’s really quite easy.  Don’t cut the pastry shells.  Put your cream filling in a piping bag with a tip on it and poke it in the bottom of the pastry shell and squeeze the cream filling inside until you can feel the pressure on the outside pastry shell.

Easy homemade cream puffs are something you should give a try.   If not all three pieces of it, then just the pastry shell, or should is say, just the Choux pastry.  We did cover several technics that are beneficial to learn.  Some are used in other recipes like Creme Brulé.  We’ll cover that sometime too.  It’s another intimidating sounding recipe that is pretty easy to do and your guests think you really out did yourself.

Happy Baking!