Pichet Ong's Pate Choux

[Ling]

^Ok, I'll try that next time. Thanks!

[OnigiriFB]

I tried making cream puffs for the first time today. I found this recipe to be awesome except mine also burned on the bottom. Not bad just a little more brown then I would like.

[schneich]

i tried the recipe today and had quite a disapointment :-(

i baked them in a convection oven and because of this

i lowered the temperature 20 C to 180 and then 150 C

at first they puffed up quite promising but after 12 minutes

or so they kind of collapsed... any idea why ???

i have to admit that i opened the oven once or twice...

cheers from cologne

torsten s.

[Ling]

^The puffs are pretty delicate when baking. They will deflate if you open the oven door.

Here's a batch I made where I opened the oven door a crack once or twice. See how they're kind of flat?

[Wendy DeBord]

Hum..........

if your bottoms are burning before the sides are finished, it's your oven. The heat element must be on the bottom of your oven and it's not cirulating the hot air around enough. Double or even triple layer your pans to insult your bottoms. The photo you show Ling, they are underbaked a hair on top and you can see the bottoms are too browned. Double laying your pans should help prevent that. Where as the photo OnigirlFB posted don't look unevenly baked............you can't tell the bottoms were burnt at all in that photo.

These shouldn't be colapsing when you open the oven door. Bake at 375F in a standard oven. At work with a confection oven I bake them at 300F which is my equlivant of 375F for that oven.

If you think about it.........why would they colapse? Seems to me that they must have just been explanding when you opened the oven door, then it let too much heat out of the oven. The answer should be that you opened your oven way to prematurely and it didn't recoupe it's heat well.

These puffs do brown quickly compared to other choux paste recipes...........and you do have to bake them all the way to assure they've dryed out enough.......cause they are more delicate/thin walled.

[Ling]

^Yeah, the bottoms are definitely browning too quickly. Thanks, Wendy. Do you think it would help if I baked them on the upper-third of the oven? I've since thrown away my old cookie pans..they were cheap and thin, so that's probably why they were browning too quickly.

[Wendy DeBord]

Sure you can bake them in the upper 1/3rd of the oven. But it may not make a big difference.......depending upon your oven and your sheet pans. Thicker sheet pans should make a big difference.

But I've baked in ovens that were so bad that my bottoms always over cooked, due to the heat source. In those cases double and triple panning were my only solution.

[NickLam]

Anyone ever had Beard Papa cream puffs from Japan? They expanded into USA about 2 or 3 years ago. www.muginohousa.com

Thanks to this recipe, I'm gonna try to recreate the taste of Beard Papa cream puffs on chilly winter mid mornings at Shibuya station! Have tried many choux paste recipes but have never been able to recreate the taste and texture of Beard Papa.

Heard from Muginoho's master franchisee in China (I sell vanilla beans to them) that their pastry shells are patented in Japan and are seeking patent in America. No idea how or why......but hey, the Japanese tried to patent curry so not that surprising.

Also, when asked why the chinese ones don't taste as good as the Japanese ones, they replied that chinese flour is not as tasty as flour from Korea, which they use in Japan. Not sure if the guy was pulling my leg, but one things for sure, the Chinese ones tasted inferior to the Japanese ones coz of the flour and defo the vanilla beans.

[miladyinsanity]

I have, and I'm not much of a fan. Great pastry, but not so great filling.

And Nick, if you search some, there have been some posts on Beard Papa on eG. Try the Hawaii forum, I think.

I made the puffs. But I can be a real nitwit.

I wanted to make them bigger than bite-size, so I spooned them out bigger. But it didn't occur to me to lower the temperature because they'd need more time in the oven.

The kicker? I even managed to forget to grease the pan!!!

I probably shouldn't have gone near the oven that day. Yes, I can laugh about it now.

[Bakerchic]

Hi again!

Sorry for the very late question, I've been reviewing the old posts in the various subjects and I found this fabulous thread.  Since I've been dying to practice, I've decided to make Ong's pate choux recipe.  I have one question.  Will I need to punch a hole in the bottom and put them back in the oven to dry out?  I have seen other recipes require that step.

Thank you!

Audrey

the above edit was a mistake!  I took the "reply" literally, and thought I had to start a thread to ask a question!  Then I remembered that everyone asks questions. 

[Kerry Beal]

Audrey,

I've made them without punching a hole and letting them dry - just make sure they stay in the oven long enough.

[AAQuesada]

btw for those that have the old Laiskonis workbooks he has what looks to be the same pate a choux recipe in grams