Buttery choux pastry topped with a sweet, crunchy cookie crust and filled with a melt in your mouth light, creamy and airy strawberry whipped cream. Plus they are in the shape of a heart! Perfect to make for your lover, situationship, or just yourself ;)
Choux pastry
125 g water
125 g milk
113 g unsalted butter (1/2 cup)
1 tbs sugar
2 tsp salt
150 g flour
5 eggs
Craquelin
113 g unsalted butter
Pinch of salt
128 g flour
128 g granulated sugar
red food coloring
Strawberry Whipped Cream
1 cup strawberries
2 cups heavy cream
2/3 cup powdered sugar
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
Craquelin
- Place the butter, salt and sugar in a bowl and cream the ingredients together until creamy and fluffy.
- Add the flour and mix until the mixture looks crumbly. Add 8-10 drops of red food coloring or as concentrated as you want the color to be.
- Using your hands, bring the crumbly bits of dough together to form a dough.
- Roll out dough between two pieces of parchment paper about 1/8 to 1/16 inch thick. Use a 3”-4” heart shaped cookie cutter to cut out hearts. Leave the hearts on the tray.
- Place tray in the freezer. they must be frozen before placing on top of choux.
Choux pastry
Makes 22-24 large puffs
- Preheat oven to 375°F. Line a baking tray with parchment paper. Use the same heart cookie cutter to outline hearts on your parchment paper. Leave at least 2"-3" of space between each heart.
- Place salt, water, milk, sugar and butter in a saucepan and heat over medium heat, stirring occasionally. When the water is starting to boil (butter should be melted at this point), remove pan from heat and add the flour all at once and vigorously mix the flour in. When the flour has absorbed the water and it's forming a dough, return the pan to the stove (medium heat).
- Cook the dough for 1 – 3 minutes (over medium heat) while you mix and move it around in the pan until you get a dough that pulls away from the sides of the pan and forms a film on the bottom of the pan.
- Transfer the dough to a large mixing bowl and let it cool slightly. Add eggs one at a time, mixing well after each addition. The mixture should be glossy, pipeable, and should resemble a thick paste.
- Place choux pastry in piping bag fitted with a large round tip. Pipe a small dollop on each corner of the tray and set your parchemnt paper over it, this will act as glue and hold it down.
- To pipe the hearts- pipe it with one squeeze like a letter “V”. Moving very slowly from the top of the heart, down to the middle. Repeat for the other half of the heart, top down to the middle. The thickness of the piped pastry is about half of an inch.
- Place each heart craquelin over choux pastry.
- Bake in preheated oven for 25-30 minutes, or until the choux pastry shells puff up and are golden brown on edges. Do not open oven door while they are baking!
- Allow the pastries to cool in the oven with the door shut for 10 minutes before removing them.
Strawberry Whipped Cream
1. Pulse berries in a blender or food processor until smooth, you should get 1/2 cup of puree from it, set it aside.
2. Add the heavy cream into a chilled mixing bowl, or the bowl of an electric mixer.
3. Whisk on high speed until peaks start to form.
4. Stir in the vanilla, powdered sugar, 1/2 cup strawberry puree.
5. Whip an additional 2 to 3 minutes, or until a light and fluffy texture is achieved.
6. Add the whipped cream to a piping bag. Use a knife to create a small slit on the bottom of the hearts. Pipe whipped cream into each heart.
Tips-
1. If you have a convection setting in your oven use it! This will help them puff up even better.
2. Do NOT open the oven door while they are in the middle of baking, this will cause them to deflate.
3. Baking time will vary depending on your oven, essentially you want to bake them as long as you can without burning them.
4. If you plan on filling your choux the next day you can recrisp them in a 350 degree oven for 5 minutes.
5. They are best eaten the day they are filled.
6. Depending on the size of your eggs, you might need between 4-5 eggs. Add the last whisked egg a little bit at a time, until you get the desired consistency.
7. Uncooked choux pastry dough can be stored in an airtight container (or pastry bag) in the fridge for up to 2 days.