Le temps de l'amour, Le temps des choses sucrées

I'm sorry for a late Valentine's day post! :(

Valentines' Day usually means flowers and chocolates, but I was never a fan of receiving chocolates which makes no difference for me since I did not have anyone give me chocolates on that day. /le sobs/ Valentine's Day was a day of love and while I had no access to the usual romantic, committed sort, it's no excuse not to spend the day making a lovely pastry dedicated to myself :)) After all, love comes in many forms--self love included, because you can't give love to others if you first don't learn to love yourself.

Here's to love and its many forms!

Have some Francoise Hardy and a choux pastry~

C'est le temps de l'amour,

le temps des copains et de l'aventure.

Quand le temps va et vient,

on ne pense a rien malgre ses blessures.

Car le temps de l'amour

c'est long et c'est court,

ca dure toujours, on s'en souvient.

Ichigo Choux Crème 
Ingredients 

4 whole eggs, well beaten

1-2 egg whites

200 ml milk or water

2 tbsp sugar

1 tsp salt

80 g. butter, chilled and sliced into small cubes

1 cup and 2 tbsp of all purpose flour, sifted

200 ml whipping cream

2 tbsp caster sugar or regular sugar

1 tsp vanilla extract

2 egg yolks

200 ml milk

1 tsp vanilla extract

4 tbsp sugar

3 1/2 tbsp pastry flour

Directions

Pâte à Choux (Choux Paste)

1. In a clean crockpot, mix together butter, sugar, salt and milk. Simmer over medium fire until the butter melts and the surface of the milk bubbles.

2. When milk-butter mixture bubbles, immediately drop in all the flour and mix vigorously until the flour absorbs the liquid and you could form a dough ball. Another important sign to look for is the presence of a white film of flour coating the bottom of the pot.

3. When you have formed a dough ball, quickly remove the pot from heat and add one beaten egg at a time to the dough. Mix the dough and egg well before adding another beaten egg. The dough will tend to separate while you are doing this, so don't panic when you see that. It will become smooth eventually. Repeat process until all four eggs-worth of beaten eggs have been dissolved into the dough.

4. The consistency should be smooth with little bits of lumps and sticky to touch. If you're not satisfied with the consistency, add the egg whites and stir until smooth:

Photo of what the choux paste should look like after adding the eggs.

keikos-cakes.com, 2009-2011.

5. Preheat the oven to 200 degrees C.

6. Have a lined baking pan ready and a clean piping bag. Scoop 3-4 tablespoon-fulls of choux paste into the piping bag. Squeeze the air out of the piping bag and keep the paste compressed by using a clothes pin to clip your piping bag tightly. Use the tip with big circle opening.

7. Place the baking tray into the preheated oven and bake in 200 degrees C for 30-40 minutes or they are puffed and lightly browned.

8. Once they are lightly browned, lower the temperature to 170 degrees C and bake for 20 more minutes. When the oven alarm signals you that it's done, do not open the oven door yet. Let the pastry cool down inside the oven. You could only take them out once the oven's surface has also cooled. Be careful with checking the temperature of your oven's surface.

DO NOT OPEN THE OVEN DOOR WHILE THE PASTRY IS COOKING. If you open it even once at any stage of the cooking process, you'll have to go back to step 1.

Assembling the Ichigo Choux à la Crème

1. Slice your choux pastry in half.

2. Spread a spoonful (or two) of the crème pâtissière in one of the halved slices.

3. Top the custard cream with strawberry slices.
4. Add or pipe the crème Chantilly over the strawberries.

5. Top with the other half of the pastry.

6. Sprinkle some icing sugar (aka powdered sugar) on top and top with another strawberry slice if desired.

In my very first choux pastry post, I made a swan-shaped cream puff. So, you would find that the steps sound similar to the swan choux post. This time is less tedious because you could just drop spoonfuls of choux paste onto the baking sheet and bake them. That doesn't stop you from getting creative with shapes, though :D 

Choux pastry is very versatile. You are not just limited to stuffing them with vanilla custard cream and whipped cream. I love making this pastry very much so aside from the swan and this strawberry choux, I have another flavor coming up <3