Eclairs – Daring Bakers
It’s been a while since I’ve been able to participate in a Daring Bakers Challenge. But I was excited to see this months challenge was eclairs. I’ve never made eclairs but really enjoyed eating them in the past. This month really flew by. I made these eclairs last weekend with plenty of time to write up my post. Then we had some family members in town and I just couldn’t find time to write this up until today. So I am a day late on posting, but better late than never!
I followed the recipe exactly for the dough and the chocolate glaze. For the pastry cream, I was worried that chocolate would make the eclair too chocolatey (is there such a thing? I say no, but hubby thinks there is).
I decided to do a raspberry pastry cream, but didn’t have raspberries on hand at the time I made it. Instead did vanilla pastry cream. For half of the pastry cream, I mixed in some mushed up raspberries after sending hubby to the store for me 🙂 The other half got the vanilla pastry cream.
I myself am not a huge fan of pastry cream. I much prefer whipped cream in the center of eclairs.
As I mentioned, I followed the recipe exactly for the dough. That includes the timing and the propping of the door with a wooden spoon. Based on what other Daring Bakers had said, I decided to cut slits into the eclairs immediately after baking and then letting them cool in the cooling oven. The ones that didn’t deflate were wonderfully hollow.
At first, I had the oven door entirely open but I did notice the eclairs were starting to deflate, so I closed the oven door and then propped it open to let them cool. The eclairs that were very close to the door did deflate while the others did not.
Thanks to our hosts (Tony Tahhan and Meeta) this month for choosing such a great recipe. I definitely enjoyed making the eclairs, although I doubt I’d make them again. It was a significant amount of work and hubby wasn’t crazy about them.
I’m not going to post the recipes here, click through to the hosts’ posts to see the recipe. The recipe I used for the pastry cream can be found here. As I mentioned, I didn’t have raspberries when I made it so I just left them out. Once it was completely cooled, I added 1 pint of smashed raspberries to 1/2 of the cream.
This chocolate glaze was amazing. I made 1/2 of the chocolate syrup recipe and it was perfect for the glaze. The leftover glaze was used on bread and then mixed with whipped cream for frosting.
I am Jen the Beantown Baker. Engineer by day and baking maven by night. Hubby serves as my #1 fan and official taste tester. We got hitched back in 2006. Barefoot. In the sand. With the waves crashing behind us. It was one of the best decisions we’ve ever made. 
Looks like these turned out great! I’m surprised they didn’t call for brushing some egg on top of the biscuits before cooking, that might get that top a little crispier…I totally want to make some of these Saturday morning.
These look very good to me. I have a favorite biscuit recipe, but want to give these a try because of the buttermilk.
Have been following your blog for a while. Nice blog!
I agree Steph. Or maybe just melted butter to give it the color.
If you want to compare even more recipes from many of the popular sites, take a look at RecipeComparison.com. Just search for “buttermilk biscuits” and you’ll see all the ingredients nicely laid out in a table with a link to jump directly to each recipe.
I worked at a KFC in the mid-90s. I had privy to the ingredients lists and methods. The biscuits came frozen and had egg in the dough. We brushed the tops after baking with butter-flavored oil that is commonly used in the restaurant industry. I remember thinking that the egg was unusual; I hadn’t seen many biscuit recipes calling for egg, and I have been baking since I was 8.
kfc.com does not list eggs in their food allergy listing for the biscuits, just an fyi
I, too, worked at a KFC when I was a teenager. The biscuits were not frozen. It was a bag mix and we mixed it with a large tub of shortening. Then mixed, rolled, cut and baked. We topped with a “liquid butter” substance fresh from the oven. They may make them frozen now, but they didn’t in the early 90’s.
Oh, and there are NO eggs in the mix. Otherwise, it would be a cake, not a biscuit. That is common baking “science”.