Heart-Shaped Cream Puffs Dessert
Plan a romantic night with your loved one making this cute heart-shaped cream puffs dessert. Covered with chocolate, these lovely decorated and fancy-looking French cream puffs create a spectacular Valentine's treat. It is sure to become a showstopper!
- Total Time: 2 hours, 30 minutes (plus resting time)
- Yield: 13-15 1x
- Category: Choux pastry
- Method: Baking
- Cuisine: French
Ingredients
Scale
For the choux puffs:
- 4 large eggs
- 3.9 oz (110 g) butter
- 7.9 fl oz (235 ml) water
- 1 cup + 2 1/2 tbsp (145 g) flour
- 1 pinch of salt
For the Chantilly cream:
- 2 cups + 4 tsp (480 g) whipping cream
- 8.5 oz (240 g) white chocolate
For the decoration:
- 7 oz (200 g) white chocolate
- 1.7 oz (50 g) ruby chocolate
- pink praline, chopped
- pink sugar pearls
- freeze-dried raspberries, chopped
- freeze-dried strawberries, chopped
- pearl sugar
* If needed, please refer to Baking Conversion Charts.
Instructions
- To make choux puffs, preheat the oven to 410 F/210 C. Sift flour in a bowl and set aside. Whisk eggs until homogeneous, pass through a sieve to remove chalazae, and put aside.
- In a saucepan over medium-high heat, place water, butter cut into small pieces, salt, and bring to a boil. Pour the fluid over sifted flour and combine it with a wooden spatula until homogeneous. Place the dough back in the saucepan and dry out the dough, constantly stirring with the spatula.
- Once the dough comes away from the pan's sides, transfer it to the bowl of a stand mixer or a simple large bowl. Mix the dough with a stand mixer or an electric mixer with the paddle attachment, using a low speed, for two minutes to cool down.
- Add beaten eggs in three to four times, mixing well between each addition. The dough has to become smooth and glossy. Test the dough by dragging your finger or a spatula along the surface of the ready dough: the sides of this "trough" have to stay upright.
- Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and fix it with a bit of dough at the corners. Place the dough in a pastry bag with Ateco plain tip 804 and pipe into a bit less than 1 inch/2 cm balls about 2 inches/4 -5 cm between each. Wet your fingertip and gently press each choux bun down. Bake for 20 minutes, until deep golden. Poke each choux bun's base with the tip of a small knife, place on sides, and bake 4 to 6 minutes longer. Remove from the oven and cool on a wire rack.
- To make the Chantilly cream, break the white chocolate into small pieces. Bring whipping cream to a boil, pour over white chocolate and mix with a hand whisk. Cover with a plastic film on contact and refrigerate overnight.
- To decorate choux puffs, whisk the cream with an electric mixer until stiff peaks. Take half of the cream, add dried strawberries powder (as much as you desire) and whisk for a few seconds to get the pink-colored Chantilly cream. Transfer white and pink cream in pastry bags with Ateco plain tip 8 and pipe each choux bun through the hole in the bottom until full.
- Break white and ruby chocolate into pieces and place them in a separate bowl. Melt chocolate in a microwave at medium power (50%) for 30 seconds. Remove and stir the chocolate. Repeat this step every 30 seconds with stirring in between until small lumps remain. Remove a bowl from the microwave and stir to complete melting.
- Dip each choux puff into melted chocolate and dip in chopped pink praline, chopped freeze-dried strawberries, and raspberries, pink sugar pearls. Leave some buns covered, drizzled, or both, with chocolate; leave some puffs with plain white or ruby chocolate. Refrigerate buns for 15 to 30 minutes until chocolate sets. Arrange decorated cream puffs in the shape of a heart and serve.
Notes
- Use silicone baking mat instead of parchment paper.
- Bake one sheet of choux puffs at a time and decorate them while another batch of puffs is baking. Bake two sheets at once if your oven bakes regularly.
- Make choux puffs one day in advance and store at room temperature till the next day.
- Replace white chocolate in the recipe of the Chantilly cream with milk, dark or ruby chocolate.
- To make dried strawberries powder, crush freeze-dried strawberries with a food processor and make the powder using a mini strainer. Omit this step if you want to make Chantilly cream, using white chocolate only.
- Decorate cream puffs as you desire: use chopped nuts (pistachios, almonds, etc.), gold sugar pearls, edible rose buds, store-bought pink crushed pralines.
- The dessert is best served within a couple of hours to keep choux puffs/shells' crispiness.
- Shape a heart out of cream puffs right after the decoration if you want to make puffs stacked one with another.
Nutrition
- Serving Size: 5 cream puffs
- Calories: 414
- Sugar: 24.1 g
- Sodium: 107 mg
- Fat: 30.4 g
- Saturated Fat: 19.9 g
- Carbohydrates: 33.6 g
- Fiber: 0.3 g
- Protein: 3.7 g
- Cholesterol: 110 mg
Find it online: https://www.bakinglikeachef.com/heart-shaped-cream-puff-dessert/