The Best Crème Pâtissière Filled Chocolate Eclairs

This recipe has been made now for most of our friends, it is a winner every time, and I am repeatedly asked for the recipe, so here it is! You will also be able to find my recipes on BBCGoodFood from late June 2020.

Ingredients

For the Choux Pastry

450ml Water

170g Unsalted butter

200g Plain flour

5 Eggs

1 Pinch of salt

1tsp Caster sugar

For the Crème Pâtissière

300ml Milk

150ml Double cream

3 Egg yolks

50g White caster sugar

3 tbsp Cornflour

1/2tsp Orange blossom

1tsp Vanilla

Chocolate Ganache

200g Dark Chocolate

75ml Double Cream

You will also need

A piping bag

1½ cm round piping nozzle

Method

First, make the choux pastry. Put the butter in a saucepan with 450ml water. Bring the butter and water to the boil, simmer until the butter has melted. Now take the saucepan off the heat. Tip in the flour and whisk. It will become thick and be binding together.

You can now add your eggs one at a time, you must beat vigorously as you do not want scrambled eggs! The batter will become glossy, and it will be struggling to fall of the spoon! Bingo that is the consistency you want!  

Heat the oven to 200C, line two baking trays, and fill your piping bag with the batter.

Now time to pipe, ensure you leave space between each one. All that water that went into the batter mix at the beginning is going to cause steam, that steam will make the éclair puff. That puff is what you want, it will create that gap that you will fill with Crème Pâtissière.

Bake for 40 minutes. Try not to open the door, as we need that steam to do its job. Once cooked, they will be crisp and golden. Leave to cool completely.

Now to make the filling. Pour the milk in to a saucepan heat up slowly it is prone to burning so be careful). In a separate bowl combine your egg yolks, sugar, orange blossom and vanilla whisk it together. Now pour over the hot milk, whisking all the time. It will thicken, you want it very thick, again careful not to burn it. Now allow it to cool. In the meantime, whisk the cream, then whisk in the custard mixture. If you are not using straight away be sure to cover with cling film touching Crème Pâtissière. Slice the eclairs in half lengthways, pipe in your Crème Pâtissière and place the lid on.

Heat the cream for the ganache, once just starting to bubble, remove from the heat and add your broken up dark chocolate. Stir thoroughly, allow to cool a little. Spoon over the eclairs.