I will write a guide to eclairs for myself. Anyway, this information is on the forum. Probably)).
This is a classic choux pastry from which eclairs are made. They are exactly the ones on the cake Ladies fingers, just mini size. Every time I start to cook, I am clearly only sure of my recipe. Everything else - the oven mode, temperature, cooking time, which nozzle I take for eclairs, which one for fingers, which one for profiteroles, etc. - I don't really remember because of my natural tendency to experiment, etc.)) And every time everything is half zero ... So I'll fix it better. So..
Eclair 🔗Dough (basic for me):250ml water (1 glass)
100g butter
a good pinch of salt
175-180g flour (1 glass with a pea)
235-240g net eggs, i.e. without shell (these are 4 pieces of CO category)
The recipe has been known since school. In the first post he is. Only he was in glasses, and over time I converted it into grams for myself.
There is another one that I used. It was used in the confectionery production of cakes and pastries and is contained in the corresponding book from 1976. (P. S. Markhel and others, p.67)
Dough 2 (production GOST):water 287
butter 245
melange (egg) 734
salt 6
flour 490
The technology is the same, but !! I always reduce the eggs in this recipe by about 10%. The fact is that in production, the melange was fed into the kneading machine not in a liquid, but in a mushy state, which increased the moisture absorption capacity of the dough. Driving in the specified number of regular eggs makes the dough a little thinner and the workpieces may become blurred. Therefore, if you decide to try this gost recipe, reduce the egg. In no case do not pour everything at once, watch the consistency.
1.
Cooking the dough... Everything is according to the classics: boil water with oil and salt, without removing from low heat, add flour, stir with a spoon for a couple of minutes. The pan remains on minimum throttle all this time. The brewed flour does not look like raw dough and also smells differently: the starch is gelatinized, due to which the dough takes up a huge amount of water, it becomes the consistency of plasticine.
🔗2. Next, let the brewed mixture cool slightly and stir in eggs one by one. The consistency is viscous, very smearing, but keeps its shape when settling, showing "ribs" from the nozzle, showing a characteristic hanging and not flowing "beak" from the dough on the mixer nozzle when pulled out of the dough after kneading.
Flour for eclairs you need a good bakery, with a good gluten content. I even add a little manitoba. Otherwise, the rise will be poor, cavities are formed reluctantly. This is quite unusual, since for most confectionery products, on the contrary, flour is diluted with starch so that there is no "tightening" effect, that is, good development of gluten. But that's exactly what you need for choux pastry.The high moisture content of the dough during baking causes the water to evaporate and expand the product from the inside, forming a cavity. But at the same time, the walls must be sufficiently elastic so as not to let steam out, but to stretch and inflate. This is the job of gluten - to act like a rubber band. Flour of poor quality, with a low gluten content, is simply inelastic, breaks through, releasing steam and the products remain quite flat.
In dough consistency also need to look for a middle ground. Too wet rises very badly and spreads over the baking sheet, too viscous rises badly too, because it quickly "hardens" from the heat and cracks, the ends of the tubes are bent upward. In view of this, before adding the last egg, give a pause and assess the state of the dough in the bowl, do not flop everything at once because you dilute the thick matter for 2 minutes, and you can not collect the liquid one. Only again to make a portion of the brew base.
3. On a baking sheet greased with a very thin film of fat or on baking paper, the dough is deposited in the form of tubes (eclairs), rings, flat cakes (shu and profiteroles). Gostovsky standard for tubes - round nozzle 18mm, for shu - round nozzle 10mm. Too greasy spreading of the baking sheet will cause the bottom of the products to crack, a dry baking sheet may stick. There should be a good distance between the deposited blanks, because a real eclair of a standard size is blown out of a strip of about 20 mm. From the specified amount of dough, you will get 2 trays, which you load one by one. The top-bottom baking mode makes it impossible to load them at the same time. I don't use convection for eclairs - cracking increases. For the fingers for the cake - you can, you still fill them with sour cream, you can't see it, you can save time)).
The attachments I use all the time (for setting tubes and rings - the smallest star in my set and a stuffing needle):
🔗 🔗4.
Baking custard takes place at a temperature of 190-220 degrees in a classic traditional oven (upper-lower heating element). For tubes and rings, it is recommended closer to the lower temperature limit, for shu and profiteroles - to the upper one. The best option is considered to be a temperature drop from high to low, if your oven allows it to be done quickly.
Therefore, we bake at 220 degrees on the "top-bottom" mode (not on convection !!) for 12 minutes. Reduce the temperature to 200 and another 12-15 minutes. Dry. Do not open the oven! The baking temperature is too high - the products do not rise well, all in tears and deformations. Because they do not have time to puff up, but baking is already taking place. The caked crust breaks off from the continued bursting. If the temperature is too low, they rise poorly due to insufficient evaporation of water inside, there is not enough "strength" to inflate.
Cracks on the surface of the finished eclair are normal. But! they should not be cross-cutting, this is considered a marriage. There are no ceremonial photos, but there are workers.
🔗 Cream250g butter
1 can of boiled condensed milk
Leave the butter at room temperature until completely softened, mix with condensed milk. Stuff eclairs by piercing the bottom or near the bottom. I put a little cream in them, because the cream is oil and it is very fatty and cloyingly sweet from my childhood memories. Therefore, I have enough for the whole batch of eclairs according to the above-written recipe. If you fill it generously, it won't be enough.
There are many creams for eclairs. Both custard and a variety of butter, but my favorite remains with boiled condensed milk and also custard in milk, flavored with orange / lemon.
Profiteroles are usually filled in the same way as eclairs - by piercing with a pastry nozzle. But shu, which, in principle, are the same, usually differ in that they have a cut off top-lid. Profiteroles snack bars can just as well be filled with pate and other savory masses. Profiteroles made from choux pastry with cheese (guzhera) are very famous as an appetizer for wine and a base for pâtés.
For finishing, I use the usual Dr. Opener. I cut off the tip thinly and apply it to the eclair.A lot of fondant (as it was trimmed back in Soviet times, by dipping the top) - it is too sweet for me, completely "naked" - less beautiful. You can also use chocolate fondant or ganache.
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