We Should Cocoa: Chocolate Éclairs with Hazelnut Crème Patisserie

This is my second entry for We Should Cocoa and held by Choclette at Chocolate Log Blog.  The entries for last month’s Raspberry challenge were amazing and can be seen here!

I decided to brush up on my choux pastry skills for Christmas so this is the perfect excuse to give it a go!

Ingredients

Choux Pastry

70gr butter

150ml water

100gr plain flour

2 eggs

1tsp hazelnut liqueur or hazelnut syrup

White Chocolate Crème Patisserie

2 eggs

3tbsp caster sugar

2tbsp cornflour

300ml milk

1tbsp hazelnut liqueur or hazelnut syrup

50gr chopped white chocolate

50gr roasted and chopped hazelnuts

Chocolate Icing

25gr butter

1tbsp hazelnut liqueur or hazelnut syrup

1tbsp cocoa powder

100gr icing sugar

Roasted and chopped hazelnuts to sprinkle

Method

Choux Pastry

1, Bring the water and butter to a light boil in a saucepan and tip the flour in all in one go.  Beat with a wooden spoon until it forms a clean ball.

2, Leave to cool for a couple of minutes before beating in the eggs and liqueur.

3, Preheat the oven to 200o/c and line a baking tray with baking paper.  Spray lightly with water.

4, Fill a piping bag fitted with a 1cm nozzle with the choux pastry and pipe the éclairs onto the prepared baking tray.  Give them a quick sprinkle/spray with more water and bake in the oven for 30 minutes or until they are golden.

5, Remove from the oven, make a split in each éclair to allow the steam to escape and cool on a wire cooling rack.

White Chocolate and Hazelnut Crème Patisserie

1, Beat the eggs, sugar and liqueur/syrup until pale in a bowl and beat in the cornflour

2, Heat the milk until just boiling in a saucepan  and pour onto the egg mixture whisking hard.

3, Pour back into the saucepan and whisk gently until it turns thick and creamy.  Stir in the white chocolate and hazelnut and leave to cool

Chocolate Icing

1, Melt the butter and beat in the rest of the ingredients

Construction

1, Split the éclairs in half

2, Pipe the Crème Patisserie into one half of the éclair and top with the other half.

3, Spread the chocolate icing and sprinkle with the hazelnuts

Store in an airtight container in the fridge.  If you can get them into the fridge without them being demolished... My tummy still hurts...