Choux Pastries!

Hello and welcome to another Daring Baker's Challenge! Kat of The Bobwhites was our August 2012 Daring Baker hostess who inspired us to have fun in creating pate a choux shapes, filled with crème patisserie or Chantilly cream. We were encouraged to create swans or any shape we wanted and to go crazy with filling flavors allowing our creativity to go wild!

Choux Pastries with Peanut Butter Chocolate Crème Filling

Pastry adapted from: Steamy Kitchen 

Chantilly cream adapted from: Martha Stewart

Ingredients (Choux Pastry AKA Pâte à Choux):

• 1 cup water
• 1 stick butter
• 1 cup flour
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 tablespoon sugar
• 4 eggs

Ingredients (Crème filling - Chantilly Cream):

• 1 cup whipping cream
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 1 tablespoon sugar
• 1 tablespoon cocoa powder
• 1 tablespoon PB2

This was a "fun shaped pastry" - I wasn't too creative, but it would be super fun to make different shapes!

Instructions:

1. Preheat oven to 425 degrees
2. Mix water, salt and butter in pot over medium heat.
3. When mixture is just bubbling, add flour, turn off heat, and mix vigorously until a dough forms - about 1 minute.
4. Transfer dough to stand mixer, start the mixer to cool it down a bit. 
5. Add eggs, one at a time, making sure the each one is fully incorporated before adding the next (this is important - you don't want to cook the eggs!)
6. Once this is done, either pipe the dough onto a prepared sheet or spoon it on (this just depends on whether you want to have fun shapes, or regular cream puff shapes)
7. Bake at 425 degrees for 10 minutes.
8. Reduce the heat to 350 degrees and bake for about 25 minutes. Start checking the dough around 18 minutes to see if it's done. It could take as long as 30 minutes, but mine only took about 25.
9. While the choux pastries are baking or cooling, make the Chantilly cream. This step is super simple - simply add everything in a stand mixer and mix until you have a whipped-cream like consistency!
10. Enjoy your pastries!

Chocolate Cupcakes with Two Frostings!

Today I had a little extra time, so I decided to make cupcakes! Because the hubby loves peanut butter cups, and my mom loves sending him them, we have an abundance of Reese's around the house. We also recently discovered Biscoff Spread (or the off-brand Trader Joe's Cookie Butter Spread). So, I decided to make chocolate cupcakes, half with peanut butter frosting and half with Biscoff frosting!

Chocolate Cupcakes

Recipe from: The Family Kitchen

 

Ingredients

1 3/4 cup flour

1 cup packed brown sugar

2 tablespoons white sugar (optional)

3/4 cup cocoa

1 cup milk (any type, dairy or non-dairy)

2 eggs

1 cup coffee (I used this)

1/2 cup oil (I used vegetable)

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon salt

2-3 teaspoons vanilla

Instructions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Mix all ingredients together in stand mixer on low. Try to get all the lumps out (it's ok if there are a few left). 

Pour batter into 24 prepared muffin tins (about 1/2 - 3/4 full).

Bake 12 at a time for 25 minutes.

Peanut Butter or Biscoff Frosting

Adapted from: All Recipes

Ingredients

1/2 cup butter

1 cup peanut butter or Biscoff spread

2-4 tablespoons milk

2 cups powdered sugar

Instructions

Place all ingredients in mixer and mix until smooth. Note: this frosting will be VERY thick. That's ok! If you like it like that, you're done! If not, you can add more milk to thin it out. 

 








 

 


 












Fun Cupcake Tips!

I used a cupcake corer and put mini Reese's in the peanut butter frosted cupcakes. I also used the corer on the Biscoff frosted cupcakes and put these chocolate bars inside. 

I also garnished the peanut butter cupcakes with Reese's and the Biscoff cupcakes with Piroulines.

I MET GIADA!

As you may or may not know, Giada De Laurentiis has a new book out and is on a book signing tour. She came to the Williams-Sonoma near me, so of course I had to go. She was super nice, talked to everyone, high-fived a couple of people - definitely everything we'd hoped for!

Meeting Giada!

Since to meet her, you had to buy her book (I say "had to," but I was super excited to get it), I thought I'd make something out of it. I ended up making the Peanut Butter Cookies with Blackberry Jam. The recipe is online at foodnetwork.com, and I would definitely recommend making them! They were a total hit! I used blackberry jam, as the recipe says, but I think many jams would work, and I plan on experimenting in the future with different types.

Here's how mine turned out:

YUM!

Cookie up close!

Reese's Puffs Cupcakes

Hello fall flowers!

Reese's Puffs Cupcakes
2 cups Reese's Puffs (ground in food processor)
3/4 cup flour
1/2 coup cocoa powder
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/3 cup oil
1 cup milk
1 egg
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup chocolate chips
1/2 cup mini Reese's (chopped)

Bake at 350 degrees for 18 minutes (15 minutes if making mini-cupcakes)

Frosting
7 tablespoons butter
2 teaspoons vanilla
3/4 cup cocoa powder
1/3 cup milk

Recipe adapted from: My Baking Heart

 Mini and normal size cupcakes!

Homemade Butterfingers!

1 pound candy corn
16 ounces peanut butter
16 ounces chocolate chips

Adapted from: Plain Chicken

Peanut Butter Swirl Bread

Oat Mixture:
1/2 cup oats
1/4 cup honey
2 tablespoons butter
1/2 tablespoon salt
3/4 cup boiling water

Dough:
1 package yeast
1 tablespoon sugar
1/2 teaspoon honey
1/4 cup warm water
2 1/2 - 3 cups flour

Filling:
3/4 cup creamy peanut butter

Bake at 350 degrees for 35 minutes

Recipe adapted from: Pink Parsley

The oat mixture

Dough rising

Rolling up the dough

Dough rising again

Bread almost done!!