My Little Eclair

My pet peeve: giant pastries.  Bakeries filled with giant muffins, scones, cupcakes, danishes etc. make me upset.  No one needs a muffin that big.  I end up not buying anything when I go in these places because I'm just so annoyed.  When you have a small pastry, you are just as satisfied.  Perhaps you are even more satisfied because you savor the three or four bites so much more than the repetitive many many chomp chomp chomps it takes to finish one of those monstrous sweet things!  Plus, the sad reality is that the larger things are, the lower the quality tends to be.  Too much of a good thing?  More like too much of a bad thing more often than not.

One of the biggest offenders I have found: the eclair.  When I do see them, which is rather rare actually, they are huge!  When I decided to make eclairs the other day for my mom's Cercle Francais 14th of July party, I made them Fred-size.  Actually, they turned out a little larger than I wanted (mostly because my pate a choux was not as stiff as it should have been...so they expanded), but I was ok with it...the solution: just share with a loved one!

So here they are.  I followed the recipe in the Flour cookbook, but as I mentioned before, I made them smaller.  (As much as I love Flour, they are a giant eclair offender...)

The beginning of the pate a choux.

Flour next.

Begin arm work-out...

...keep going.  Feel the burn!!

Plop.

Beautiful, rich eggs go in next.

Soooo shiny (perhaps a little too liquid, I would discover later).

Why make 12 giant eclairs and feed only 12 people when you can make two or three times as many mini ones and make two or three times as many people smile and say yummmm. 

Out of the oven, nice and puffed...but they could have been more puffed.  Also, not showing you the other tray because something wacky happened with those and they are not so easy on the eyes...don't worry though, they will be consumed!  A little chocolate cover-up goes a long way.

Hello plumpies.

"Tropez cream" I had made earlier now being folded with whipped cream to lighten it up.

Finished cream.  I have yet to find something this doesn't taste good on.

Ganache - one of the most simple yet most delicious things to make.

The best quality dark chocolate and cream combine to make the most delicious ganache.

Sliced down the middle.

Filled with cream.

Dipped in ganache.

Ready to take on the party.

My goal after this task: improve my pate a choux.