Serve with chocolate sauce, or drizzle the profiteroles with melted dark chocolate.
Ingredients
- ingredients for the choux pastry:
- 250 ml cold water
- 110 g butter
- 150 g strong flour
- 4 large eggs
- pinch of sugar and salt
- ingredients for the filling:
- 175 ml whipped cream
- 110 g dark chocolate (melted)
Method
- Preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F/Gas 4).
- Grease two baking sheets with melted butter.
- Put the butter, water, salt and sugar in a large saucepan and bring to the boil.
- It is important that the mixture comes to the boil - if you just melt it and do not allow it to come to the boil the mixture will go dramatically wrong.
- Take the saucepan off the heat.
- Sift the flour and add to the boiling liquid.
- Stir rapidly with a wooden spoon.
- Return to heat and beat continuously until the mixture comes clean away from the sides of the saucepan. You are cooking the flour at this stage.
- Transfer to a large mixing bowl and allow to cool for about 5 minutes.
- In a separate bowl whisk the eggs together.
- Slowly beat the eggs into the cooked paste. I tend to use an electric whisk as the mixture can be quite stiff. Add the eggs little by little, beating thoroughly between each addition.
- Spoon on/pipe small amounts of the mixture onto the tray. You should get approximately 30-35 profiteroles. Bake for 35-40 minutes until they sound hollow when tapped on the underneath. Remove from the oven and allow them to cool on a wire rack.
- When they are cool, split each profiterole, fill with fresh cream and serve with chocolate sauce, or drizzle the profiteroles with melted dark chocolate.
- Top Tips:
- Make sure to use strong flour - it gives a crisper end product.
- Ensure that the butter and water not only melt together, but come to the boil - this is the most critical stage.
- Choux pastry can be used for savoury purposes: by filling with some goat's cheese, smoked salmon mousse or Thai-infused crab meat.
- Freeze any filled profiteroles for a later date and serve semi-frozen with hot chocolate sauce.
- The salt adds stability to the pastry and aids the crispening process. Sugar assists in giving them the golden brown colour so no need to egg wash prior to baking.
