Profiteroles

What pass time would occupy me on a cold autumnal day? Baking of course!

I am not a great baker. I love to bake but have never got the hang of making cakes, pies, bread, etc. So what better way to start but to make my ultimate gluttony laden dessert - Chocolate Profiteroles.

We usually buy these at the supermarket, these perfectly round light airy pastry filled with fresh cream and dipped in chocolate, definitely my idea of pure heaven. Why not try to make this luxurious recipe?

My 1st attempt of profiteroles

I followed a typical profiterole recipe from a book - Grandma's best recipes from Love Food. The recipe looked straight-forward enough, or at least I thought so. The level of difficulty for perfecting the consistency of the batter for the choux bun is way beyond my comprehension. I should just stick to baking fairy cakes and cupcakes. But I will persevere, I will not give up! As they say - Practice Makes Perfect!

Book's version - how it's supposed to look like

My first attempt was, let's say, not very attractive and not at all like the picture shown in the book. But do not judge a book by it's cover, the taste was pretty spot on. My second batch was less of a success, it was under baked and very flat. So I decided to ditch the second lot and make do with my first. I think I may need to practice this recipe a few more times to hone this skill.

My first batch of flat choux buns

My profiteroles may not look the part but it was still very tasty and gained much praise from my brother and his girlfriend.

To hide the fact that the recipe did not result in the cookbook perfect presentation, I also made a sponge cake filled with nutella as a back up dessert. And my brother's girlfriend also brought over an apple crumble so we were filled up on a trio of desserts which left us pretty food drunk by the end of the evening.

Profiteroles

• 5tbsp butter 
• 200ml water
• 100g plain flour
• 3 eggs (beaten)
• 300ml double cream
• 1tbsp caster sugar
• 125g milk chocolate
• 2 1/2 tbsp butter
• 6tbsp water

Preheat the oven to 200C.

Grease a large baking sheet with butter.

For the pastry: place the water and 5tbsp of butter in a saucepan and bring to the boil. Meanwhile, sift the flour into a bowl. Remove the saucepan from the heat and beat in the flour until smooth. Cool for 5 minutes.

Beat in enough of the eggs to give the mixture a soft, dropping consistency.

Transfer to a piping bag fitted with a 1cm plain nozzle. Pipe small balls onto the baking sheet. Bake for 25 minutes. Remove from the oven. Pierce each ball with a skewer to let steam escape.

For the filling: whip together the cream and sugar. Cut the pastry balls almost in half, then fill with the cream filling.

For the sauce: gently melt the 2 1/2 tbsp of butter with the water in a small saucepan, stirring, until smooth. Pile the profiteroles into a dish and pour over the sauce and serve.