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Cooking
Eclairs à la Ladurée – irresistibly delicious pastries
· 20 servings
Shortcrust (craquelin) dough
Mix diced butter with flour, sugar and vanilla (or use vanilla-infused sugar, or vanilla sugar). Work everything together well, wrap in plastic wrap and chill in the fridge for an hour.
Choux pastry
Put the milk, water and butter in a saucepan and bring to the boil. Add the flour, sugar and salt, stirring constantly – the dough should form a ball that starts pulling away from the bottom and sides of the pan. That's how you know it's ready.
Add the eggs
Transfer the dough to a bowl, let it cool slightly, then beat in the eggs one at a time until the dough is smooth and glossy.
Pipe the eclairs
Fill a piping bag fitted with a round tip (about 2.5 cm) and pipe 'logs' roughly 10 cm long onto a baking sheet lined with parchment paper. Leave plenty of space between each piece, as the pastry puffs up quite a bit.
Roll out the shortcrust dough
Take the shortcrust dough out of the fridge, knead briefly, then roll it out to a thickness of 1–2 mm. Cut out rectangles about 4 cm x 12 cm and place one on top of each piped choux 'log'.
Bake
Bake in an oven preheated to 180°C until golden. In my oven this took about 30 minutes. Remove from the oven and let cool completely before filling.
Custard cream
Whisk together the egg yolks and sugar, then add the cornstarch and beat until the mixture is pale yellow and thickened. Pour the milk into a saucepan. Split the vanilla pod lengthwise, add the seeds to the milk and bring to the boil.
Cook the custard
Slowly pour the hot milk into the egg yolk mixture, whisking constantly. Pour everything back into the saucepan and bring to the boil, stirring all the time. Cook until the mixture thickens, then whisk in the butter. Cover with plastic wrap and let cool.
Whip and fill
Whip the cream and fold it into the cooled custard cream. Fill the prepared eclairs by piercing three small holes with the piping tip and injecting the cream inside. Dust with powdered sugar just before serving.
Tip:
Eclairs are best filled right before serving – if you leave them filled in the fridge for too long, the pastry turns soggy and loses its charm. Store the unfilled shells in an airtight container.