Elegant Profiteroles: a Superb Holiday Dessert

The French have a charming expression, on profite, as in on profite du soleil (The sun is out? Drink it up!) to signify an existing situation of which one must take advantage.  I regard the upcoming holidays as such an occasion.  Profiteroles are one of those wonderful desserts that look much more difficult to do than in reality--as long as you have solid instructions to follow.  They are simply cream puffs filled with ice cream, usually vanilla and topped with a dark chocolate sauce.  They can be regarded as ice cream sandwiches taken to lofty heights.

Caramel-laced pecan vanilla ice-cream on the left and two coffee ice-creams on the right

I used Stephanie Jaworski's tested recipe (please read her recipe completely before making profiteroles), because it stood out from all the others I researched on the web by being thorough, clear, and eminently doable.  These profiteroles were the best I ever had, including the ones I enjoyed in Paris, Lyon, Grenoble, or in our favourite French restaurant in Greenwich Village.  And better than the ones I used to bake.  The pâte à choux is perfectly thin, crisp, with a slight inside moisture while the warm, dark-chocolate ganache is beyond dreamy, loaded with butter and cream.  In case you are wondering, we eat ours with a spoon!

If I had this recipe years ago, I am sure my first attempt at making cream puffs would not have come out as flat cookies.  Cream puffs can be stuffed with either sweet or savoury fillings--creamed chicken or seafood is good--and be made as tiny or as substantial as the occasion calls for.  Go ahead and make some this holiday season and on profite!

Piled into a pyramid, they make a stunning presentation

Profiteroles
Makes 12 medium (approx. 2" in diameter) profiteroles

• Flour, all purpose, 1/2 cup*/65 grams
• Sugar, white, granulated, 1/2 tsp
• Salt, 1/4 tsp
• Water, 1/2 cup*/120 ml
• Butter, sweet, 4 tablespoons/57 grams
• Eggs, large, 2, lightly beaten
• 1/8 tsp salt and 1 large beaten egg for glaze.
• Chocolate, dark, cocoa content 64% or higher, 4 oz/115 grams, broken into pieces
• Cream, heavy, 1/2 cup*/120 ml
• Butter, sweet, 1 tablespoon/14 grams, for the ganache
• Ice cream, homemade or an excellent brand, vanilla or coffee are popular, but most flavours would work.

*American size, that is, 8 oz cups.

Make the choux pastry as follows:

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F/205 degrees C. Have close by water, butter, sifted flour/salt/sugar, and beaten eggs.

Bring the butter and water to a boil in a medium saucepan.

Take the pot off the heat and stir in the flour.

Put pot back on low heat and mix for a few minutes until dough pulls away from the sides of the pot.

Beat dough off the heat until it is lukewarm.

Beat in eggs. I first use a whisk.

Then switch to a wooden spoon to get a smooth batter.

Spoon or pipe on parchment-lined baking pans.  When spooning, it is best to layer smaller amounts so as to increase the height of each puff--first put one slightly rounded teaspoonful of the batter for each of the twelve profiteroles, then put a second teaspoon of it on top. Distribute any remaining batter over the twelve profiteroles as evenly as possible via a final layer.  With a pastry brush or with a fingertip, lightly paint each one with beaten egg.

Choux pastry needs to be baked twice--initially at 400 degrees F/205 degrees C for fifteen minutes, then at 350 degrees/177 degrees C for an additional 30-40 minutes.  Test one by splitting it--the insides need to be mostly dry and the outside crisp and a deep golden brown.  Then the oven heat is turned off, and they are left inside with the oven door cracked open for about five to ten minutes.  Just as importantly they need to be cooled on a wire rack.  An old oven rack can be called into duty. 

The puffs can be baked ahead of time, but the longer they stand before they are assembled, the softer they become.  The puffs can be frozen. Defrost the puffs and then reheat in a 350 degree F/177 degree C oven for 5 to 10 minutes or until crisp. Cool before filling with ice cream.

Make the ganache.  Break up the chocolate into smaller pieces and put them in a small metal mixing bowl.

Using a small saucepan, bring the cream and butter to a boil.  Pour the hot cream and butter over the broken-up chocolate in the metal bowl.  Cover and set stand for ten minutes.

Then whisk smooth the the butter, cream, and chocolate.  The ganache can be flavoured, as with brandy or cognac for an extra glow.  The warm sauce serves as a wonderful foil for the cold ice cream.

Assemble the profiteroles.  Cut them in halves.

Place nice, rounded scoops (approx. two rounded tablespoons) of ice cream.

Put on tops.

Dribble the ganache over the profiteroles.

If there is excess ganache, you can easily make sublime chocolate truffles.  How sublime?  Truffles are edible velvet.  Working with very cold ganache, scoop out little balls and dust in cocoa powder or crushed nuts.  And yes, if you want, you can just make the truffles and skip the cream puffs!  I won't tell anyone.  Bon appétit!

An unadorned truffle which I can assure you tastes scrumptious by itself.

Back in the garden, a rose bud hesitates to bloom.

In the potager, the fall/winter crops are doing well--broccoli, Brussels sprouts, leeks, carrots, and peas. 

Broccoli and Brussels sprouts beds in the background

I love topping up bowls of Velouté de Carottes with chopped, roasted broccoli which is added to the soup along with French bread chunks and bacon pieces.

Hearty, golden goodness!

Dayo enjoys climbing the bare trees as the days are still mostly mild.

He loves the Fig tree as it borders on three different yards.

Our short winter should begin in a week or so as the cranes have have left for North Africa.  They were not seen this season, but their wonderful honking was heard--at least by Monsieur M--as they migrated at night.

À bientôt

Chicken Pot Pie...and the goodness of a basic pastry crust

Though a chicken pot pie is some serious comfort food, it also has culinary flair by dint of a tender, flaky crust and a Suprême Sauce binding the filling.  Regard making it as a delicious means of learning some basic culinary techniques!

Ingredients
Makes one 9 inch pie and one 4 inch ramekin

See here for instructions to make the broth and the cooked chicken for this recipe.

• Flour, white, 1.5 cups*/215 grams
• lard, 1/2 cup*/108 grams
• Salt, 1/4 tsp
• Water, iced, a few Tbls
• Chicken, cooked, chopped, 3 cups*
• Peas, fresh or frozen, cooked, 1.5 cups*
• Carrots, cooked, chopped, 1 large
• Cream, 3/4 cup*
• Broth, 1.25 cups*
• Nutmeg, freshly grated, a large pinch or two
• Butter, 4 T
• Flour for the roux, 5 T

*American cup size, 8 oz.

Equipment

Pastry board or smooth work surface
Rolling pin
Spatula, long, thin, metal, flat or offset
Parchment paper
9 inch pie plate (2)
Ramekin (2), 1 1/2 cup* size, oven proof
Wire whisk 

Instructions

The night before, reserve about an half of cup of water in the fridge.  Keep the lard cold but not frozen.  Though I heard that lard gives the best results, when I lived in America shortening ruled and lard was hard to come by.  Delightfully, that is not the case in France.  However, it seems lard is making a come back in the States.  See Related Links below to find substitutions for lard.

The next day start the filling followed by the pastry crust.  Chop the carrots into approximately 1/2 inch mince and toss into a small pot of boiling water for about 2-3 minutes.  Add the peas and simmer for about another 5-8 minutes, testing for tenderness.  Drain and reserve.

Melt the butter and add the flour gradually, stirring all the while.  Cook over low heat for a minute or two to get out the raw taste of the flour.  Traditionally the proportion in a roux is one to one for flour to butter, but I find that I can get away with less butter, hence 5 T flour to 4 T butter.

Pour into the pot as gradually as possible the chicken broth all the while stirring until smooth.  Use a wire whisk to get out any lumps. The substitution of chicken broth instead of milk makes the sauce at this stage a Velouté instead of the basic white sauce, Béchamel. 

Then stir in the cream.  With the addition of cream, the sauce now is a Suprême Sauce.  (One could say French sauces are a bit inbred.)  Add a touch of freshly grated nutmeg.

Simmer until nicely thick.

Then add in the peas, carrots, and chopped, cooked chicken. Salt per taste. Reserve covered in the pot off the heat.

A flaky, tender short-crust pastry is not something most will do fairly well at first go.  My first attempt decades ago resulted in a crust resembling cardboard in texture.  I then went into the opposite direction--it was so crumbly that the finished pie looked more like a patchwork quilt.  Eventually I got it right, but I must confess each time I make a pastry crust, I wonder if the quality will be OK.  But, it always is.  The nicest compliment I have received regarding my baking is when a friend whispered to me over the table that my pie crust is better than her grandmother's.  You too will be able consistently to turn out both savoury and sweet pies/turnovers that will delight your friends, family, and guests.

For something that needs just a few ingredients--flour, fat, water, and salt--the difficulty lies solely in the technique along with the understanding that since the age of flours differ, the older will be more absorbent, the younger less so.  Therefore, the addition of the right amount of water becomes challenging.

Mix flour and salt into a bowl.  Quickly cut the cold lard into small pieces and add.  Delia Smith goes against the consensus of using fat that is cold--check out her approach in Related Links at the end of this post.

Using your fingers, work the lard into the flour till there is a coarse mixture of mostly pea-sized pieces.  This should take no more than a few minutes--work fast and lightly.  A food processor can be used for this step by pulsing it several times.

Tablespoon by tablespoon add the ice water.

Immediately after each tablespoon, get those fingers underneath the mixture to make sure that no water is pooling there.  Your fingers need to search out any soggy bits which is a warning sign that you are adding too much water.  It usually takes 2.5 to 4 tablespoons when I make pastry dough which is quite a variation.  Right in the bowl, press the dough into a ball like mass from time to time to see if there is enough cohesion without the need to add any additional water.  Sometimes all that is needed to get that final bit of moisture is to wet your fingertips, and then touch any remaining dry bits.

When properly moistened, dump the contents onto a pastry board.

Knead lightly--no more than five times--into a ball.  Put in the fridge for at least 10 minutes; 30 minutes may be better to encourage elasticity. Preheat oven to 425 degrees F/220 degrees C

While the dough is chilling in the fridge, pour the filling into one 9 inch pie plate and one ramekin.  Have an empty pie plate and ramekin handy for cutting templates.

Remove the dough from the fridge and put it on a moderately floured board.  Flatten and flour it lightly.

Using a light and quick touch, roll it out which should take about a minute or so.  Starting with a back and forth motion, I then work from the centre, rolling it out all around the perimeter. Lightly dust the rolling pin and dough to prevent sticking.  The more flour is used, the less tender the crust will be, so lightly is the word.  It is entirely permissible to lop off non-needed dough and attach it to the places where it is needed.  Place another pie plate on the circle as a template and cut all around about an inch from the template.  Gather the scraps into a small ball and reserve in the fridge for latter rolling out for the ramekin's pastry top.

A long, narrow spatula (looks like a long, thin knife with a blunted end) is then used to loosen carefully the dough circle from the board.  Some roll the dough out on waxed paper which I have never used so I can't vouch for its effectiveness in ease of transferring the circle off the board.

Fold in half and slide on the pie plate with the filling, placing the folded edge right smack in the middle of the pie plate as you will not be able to adjust placement once it is unfolded.  Unfold. 

Tuck under dough so it does not overhang the plate.  Then make a decorative, fluted edge by using your left thumb and index finger on the inside perimeter to support the dough via indenting with the right index finger on the outside perimeter.  Slash to allow the escaping of steam during baking--start with the longest one in the centre and then work out to the sides with graduated smaller slashes.  Roll out the smaller circle to top the ramekin, using the spare ramekin as a template.  Any remaining scraps can be shaped into a small round and place on top of the ramekin.  Slash the ramekin pastry.

Put the finished pie and ramekin on a shallow baking pan lined with parchment paper to catch spills and make cleaning easier.  Put in oven for about 30 minutes, rotating it half way for even baking.  I need to do this though I use a convection setting which supposedly ensures even browning.

Remove when nicely browned, and let stand for about ten minutes before cutting so as to let the filling solidify a bit.

Bon appétit!

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Velouté de Carottes
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RELATED LINKS

Delia Smith short crust pastry instructions 
(How to roll out circles, squares, and oblongs, sifting flour and mixing from up high technique to increase lightness, not to mention the heresy of using room temperature lard/butter!)
Rose Levy Berenbaum’s fabled recipe for perfect short crust pastry at Joe Pastry
(All butter dough with additional cream cheese and a more complicated technique resulting in a superb pastry)
Joe Pastry's Standard short crust pastry
(Similar to mine but calls either for vegetable shortening or lard)

The Frugality of Chicken: Two Soups and a Pot Pie...and the pleasure of friendship

Chicken soup really does help in healing from colds.  Among other properties, its abundance of the amino acid cysteine clears congestion.  When a kid, I would be given canned chicken soup consisting of soggy noodles, tiny pieces of rehydrated chicken, and a broth spiked with MSG.  I was fairly content with fare like this until my early twenties when a Jewish boyfriend taught me how to make his aunt's hallowed version.

This recipe which has evolved through time is a culinary workhorse as I am able to make several different meals from its broth, carrots, and meat--a hearty chicken soup, velouté de carottes, and chicken pot pie.  As both The Calm One and I had colds recently, it was a boon to have several quarts of the soup in our freezer.

First the stock is made by barely covering two medium-sized chickens with water--if you can find a capon then both the soup and chicken pot pie will be even better.  While the water is coming to the boil, add 4 large, peeled, whole carrots, 3-4 medium onions, a few stalks of celery or a smaller amount of lovage, a few sage leaves, a small handful of peppercorns, one or two bay leaves, a couple sprigs of thyme, and several sprigs of parsley.  Do not add salt now because it may be necessary to reduce the broth, and it would then become too salty.  It is easier to skim off the foam before adding the herbs.

I skim off most of the foam without becoming obsessive about it

After an hour, check to see if the drumsticks move easily, but not so freely that they fall off the joint.  The aim is not to overcook the breast meat as nothing is more disappointing than dry chicken.  Carefully remove each chicken onto a platter by inserting a large wooden spoon in its cavity while supporting its bottom with another wooden spoon.  Remove the carrots which will have soaked up the broth beautifully and will be soft and flavoursome.  Though crisp veggies are often regarded as desirable, sometimes savoury succulence wins as in this case.

Let the chickens cool enough for handling and bone them completely, putting everything, that is, the skin and bones, back into the stockpot while reserving the meat.  Simmer for another four hours to extract all the goodness.

Dayo stays in his box on his end of the long food-preparation table as I trained him as a kitten when cats are somewhat receptive to being told what to do.  He did make interesting faces though when I boned the chickens!

After removing as much of the bones and skin I can with a slotted spoon, the cooled stock is then strained through a mesh strainer.  I reserve about two quarts of stock and half the meat for the chicken soup.  Skim any fat off the surface of the broth.  Pour the broth into a suitable sized pot and add a cup of brown rice, simmering for about twenty minutes until the rice is very tender.  Meanwhile, chop the carrots and the chicken.

When the rice is soft, add the chopped carrots and chicken.  Voila:  delectable chicken soup with a rich broth, chicken and carrot chunks, and brown rice!

When I first served this to my mum-in-law, she said I put too many solid bits into her soup-plate as she is used to thin soups served as a first course.  When I told her that is all she is going to eat, she then guided the ladle of solid bits I was removing from her bowl back into it!  Everybody at the table had a good chuckle.

Another quart of the broth is reserved for velouté de carottes.

The remaining half quart and the rest of the chicken is reserved for a pot pie.

Look for the recipe soon!

Feisal Kamil is a Malaysian friend I had the good fortune to meet on G+.  He recently came across a book that reminded him of me without knowing that said book is a classic often gifted to gardeners:  The Country Diary of an Edwardian Lady.   Being the affectionate and generous person he is, he sent it off to me with a note apologising for it being second hand.  I countered his apology with my insisting its aged cream pages coupled with an enticing old-book smell only increased his gift's charm.

It is a book impossible to review in the ordinary manner as one only can experience it personally in all its enchanting uniqueness.  Edith Holden supplemented her neat, cautious calligraphy with her own watercolour illustrations of flowers, birds, and trees she saw on her country walks.

Her book, as far as I can see, only makes sense if it is read like a diary which means since it came into my life in November I started my reading at that point.   Her November entry has this poem by Burns:

Sing on sweet thrush, upon the leafless bough,
Sing on sweet bird, I listen to thy strain,
And aged Winter, mid his early reign,
At thy blythe carol, clears his furrowed brow.

Her own 1906 observations made in England during November overlap with those I am experiencing presently in France:  foraging for mushrooms, noting plants gone to seed--cow-parsnip and dock for her, fennel and broccoli for me--and her describing...the scanty foliage on the half bare Oak trees which brings to mind I soon will be going to the small Oak copse nearby to bag up all those precious leaves to make the superlative treat for any garden, leaf mould. 

There are still a few flowers brightening up our garden.

Japanese anemones

Sweet Alyssum

The lavender are still putting out a bud here and there

But mostly, there are fallen leaves.

Rose of Sharon beginning its dormancy

Soon there will be sedge after sedge of loudly honking cranes flying overhead with their necks gracefully outstretched as they wend their way to North Africa.  Their migration heralds the beginning of our cold but short winter and a chance for Dayo to transfix his gaze at the grey sky.

À la prochaine!

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Chicken Pot Pie