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Cream Puffs
1 cup hot water 1/2 cup butter Pinch of salt 1 cup flour 3 eggs Boil the water, butter and salt; stir in the dry flour while it is boiling and stir quickly until the mass thickens. Stand aside to cool and when cool add the eggs, unbeaten, and stir them in thoroughly. Drop the mixture by tablespoons on buttered tins and bake for about twenty minutes in a quick oven. When cool cut open with a sharp knife and fill with cream.
This is classic pâte à choux, written down before anyone bothered to explain the mechanics. The proportions are sound; the oven directions and timing need translating.
- Oven temperatureA "quick oven" is usually read as 425-450F. Puffs need that heat at the start to turn their water into steam and inflate the shell. Many modern recipes start at 425F for 15 minutes, then drop to 350F for another 15-20 until the shells are deep brown and sound hollow.
- Twenty minutes is not enoughPulled at 20 minutes the shells will be pale and will collapse as they cool. Bake until they are genuinely browned and firm, 30–35 minutes total for tablespoon-sized puffs, then pierce each one to let the steam escape.
- The hinge: cool, but not coldThe recipe says to let the paste cool before the eggs go in. In practice most cooks now let it cool only to warm rather than to room temperature: too hot and the eggs scramble, while a fully cold paste stiffens and takes the eggs less readily. A few minutes of stirring in the pan is usually enough.
- Eggs one at a timeThe original says add the eggs unbeaten, which is correct, but add them singly and beat each one in completely before the next. The paste will look broken after each addition and come back together. Three large eggs is the modern equivalent; the dough should fall from the spoon in a thick ribbon.
- Butter quantityHalf a cup is 4 oz or 113 g, and 1 cup flour is about 4.5 oz or 125 g. The high fat ratio is deliberate and gives a tender shell.
- Buttered tinsParchment on a heavy sheet works better than butter, which encourages the bases to spread and scorch. Leave two inches between the mounds.
- "Fill with cream"The recipe does not specify which; either sweetened whipped cream or a vanilla pastry cream suits. Fill only just before serving, or the shells soften.
- YieldAbout 18 to 20 tablespoon-sized puffs. Unfilled shells keep a day in a tin and can be crisped for a few minutes in a 350F oven.
Choux paste is traditionally traced to sixteenth-century Italian pastry cooks working in France, and its name is often said to come from the cabbage-like look of the baked mounds; the technique of cooking flour into boiling liquid before adding eggs was well established in French professional kitchens by the nineteenth century. By the time this book was compiled, cream puffs had become a standard American domestic dessert, one that demonstrates leavening by steam alone, with no baking powder, yeast or beaten egg white involved.