strawberries and cream – Brownie Mischief

Imagine you’re in a beautiful room, reclining on a plush velvet chaise lounge. There’s a dainty table nearby. On the table is a cake pedestal with a little pyramid of small, perfectly plump, pink pastries. They’re filled with sweet, luscious strawberry cream. And they’re all yours. This Strawberries & Cream Profiteroles recipe can make that dream come true. Maybe not the velvet chaise lounge, but really any comfortable chair will do while you indulge in these delicious little gems. Profiteroles have a way of making you feel regal and majestic. I think princesses and princes snack on them. Most of us don’t have a personal pastry chef or the budget to order from a French bakery every day, but we can certainly follow a recipe and make one of the easiest pastry doughs there is. Choux pastry or pate à choux is used to make profiteroles, cream puffs, eclairs, churros and other pastries. Once you get the hang of it, the possibilities are endless.

This recipe features fresh strawberries, but frozen strawberries will work too. You can also substitute raspberries or peaches. To find the recipe for Peaches & Cream Profiteroles, click here. The strawberry purée can be made a day or two ahead and stored in the refrigerator. To make it easy on myself, I like to make the strawberry purée on day one, the pastry cream on day two, then make the profiteroles and strawberry icing and assemble on day three. It’s also helpful to practice the French culinary style of prep, mise en place, which means to have all of your ingredients and equipment in place before you begin. Everything will go much smoother and prevent you from feeling overwhelmed.

Strawberries & Cream Profiteroles

Mari Vasseur

Bite sized choux pastry puffs filled with fresh strawberries and cream filling and topped with fresh strawberry icing

Print Recipe

Course Dessert

Cuisine French

Servings 18 profiteroles

Ingredients

Strawberry Pureé

12 ounces (340g) strawberries, hulled and sliced About 2 1/2 cups after hulling and slicing
1 teaspoon lemon juice
½ teaspoon strawberry extract

Strawberries and Cream Filling

1 cup (237ml) whole milk
⅓ cup (66g) sugar
2 tablespoons (17g) cornstarch
¼ teaspoon fine sea salt
1 large egg
2 tablespoons (28g) unsalted butter, cubed
½ teaspoon pure vanilla extract
Strawberry puree recipe above
⅔ cup (156ml) heavy whipping cream

Profiteroles

½ cup (118ml) water
¼ cup (57g) unsalted butter, cubed
⅛ teaspoon fine sea salt
½ cup (64g) all purpose flour
2 large eggs room temperature

Strawberry Icing

¾ cup (90g) powdered sugar
2 tablespoons (30ml) reserved strawberry purée
1 tablespoon (15ml) heavy whipping cream
¼ teaspoon strawberry extract

Instructions

Strawberry Purée

Purée the strawberries in a blender or food processor. Strain the puréed strawberries through a sieve into a small saucepan. Stir in the lemon juice.
Bring to a boil over medium heat. Reduce heat and simmer until the strawberry purée is reduced by half. Remove from heat. Stir in the strawberry extract. Set aside to cool completely

Strawberries and Cream Filling

Bring the milk to a boil in a small saucepan over medium heat.
Meanwhile, whisk the sugar, cornstarch and salt together in a medium bowl. Add the egg and whisk until smooth.
When the milk starts to boil, remove from heat and pour 1/3 of the hot milk into the egg mixture and whisk to combine.
Pour the egg mixture back into the remaining hot milk and cook over medium heat, whisking continuously, until the mixture comes to a boil and thickens.
Remove from heat. Stir in the butter and vanilla extract. Pour the mixture through a sieve placed over a bowl. Cover the surface with plastic wrap and let cool completely.
Set aside 2 tablespoons (30ml) of strawberry purée. Add the remaining strawberry purée to the cooled pastry cream and stir until well combined. Cover strawberry pastry cream and chill in refrigerator.
In a medium-sized bowl, whip the heavy cream, with an electric mixer at high speed, until stiff peaks begin to form. Fold the whipped cream into cooled strawberry pastry cream. Set aside in the refrigerator.

Profiteroles

Preheat oven to 400ºF (205ºC). Line 2 large baking sheets with parchment paper.
Combine the water, butter and salt in a medium-sized saucepan. Bring to a boil over medium heat. Reduce the heat. Add the flour and stir vigorously with a wooden spoon until the mixture pulls away from sides of pan and forms a ball.
Transfer the mixture to the bowl of a stand mixer. Mix on low speed until steam dissipates and mixture cools to lukewarm. Add the eggs one at a time and beat on medium speed until smooth, stopping to scrape down the bowl.
Transfer the mixture to a piping bag fitted with a large round tip. (I used Ateco tip 808.*) Pipe 1 1/4-inch mounds, about 2 inches apart, onto the prepared baking sheets. Smooth the tops lightly with a wet finger.
Bake for 15 minutes, then turn down the oven heat to 350ºF (180ºC) and continue baking until golden brown, about 8-10 more minutes. Using a toothpick or skewer, prick a small hole in each profiterole to allow steam to escape. Place on a wire rack to cool completely.
Use the tip of a paring knife to make a pilot hole in the bottom of each profiterole.
Place strawberries and cream filling into a piping bag fitted with a medium round piping tip. (I used Wilton tip 12**) Place the tip into the pilot holes and fill each profiterole with filling.

Strawberry Icing

In a medium -sized bowl, whisk all of the icing ingredients together until smooth. Spoon over the filled profiteroles. Refrigerate profiteroles until ready to serve.

Notes

*To find Ateco tip 808 click here.

**To find Wilton tip 12 click here.

Keyword profiteroles, strawberry

May is when I get to pull out all of my summery recipes. These pretty little Strawberries & Cream Tarts remind me of a summer day. The kind of day when you’re outside enjoying the sunshine and you’re craving a cool, refreshing dessert. This strawberry cream filling alone is so delicious that I could just eat the entire bowl with a spoon. But since I’m extra, I had to create an aesthetic dessert with it.

I used my favorite tart shells for this recipe, but this would also be delicious with those little pre-made graham cracker pie crusts if you want to take a shortcut. The reason I love this tart crust recipe so much though, is that it actually tastes delicious. Once, a few years ago, I purchased a beautiful, small fruit tart from a famous bakery. The fruit was vibrant and glistening and the pastry cream filling was sweet and silky. Now we need the sound of a mic drop, because the tart crust was hard and flavorless, like cardboard! Ever since then, I knew I would settle for nothing less than a delicious tart crust.

Strawberries & Cream Tarts

Print Recipe

Course Dessert

Servings 6 4-inch tarts

Ingredients

Tart Crust

1 ½ cups (6.75 ounces) all purpose flour, sifted
¼ cup (1 ounce) powdered sugar, sifted
¼ teaspoon fine sea salt
½ cup (4 ounces) cold, unsalted butter, cubed
1 egg yolk
1-2 tablespoons ice water

Strawberry Cream Filling

2 cups (16 ounces) strawberry puree Plus more for garnish
½ cup (3.5 ounces) granulated sugar
3 tablespoons water
2 teaspoons unflavored gelatin powder
½ cup (4 ounces) cream cheese, softened
½ teaspoon strawberry extract
½ teaspoon vanilla extract
½ cup (4 ounces) cold heavy whipping cream

Instructions

Tart Crust

In a bowl, whisk together flour, powdered sugar and salt. Set aside.
Work in butter and egg yolk with a pastry blender or with your fingers, until pea size pieces are formed.
Add ice water, one tablespoon at a time, until dough comes together.
Form dough into a disc. Wrap in plastic and refrigerate for one hour.
On a lightly floured surface, roll dough to a scant 1/4-inch thickness
Cut dough into six 5-inch rounds. Press rounds into six 4-inch or 4 1/4-inch tart pans.*
Dock the bottoms of pie crusts with a fork. Freeze for 30 minutes.
Heat oven to 375ºF. Place tart pans on a large baking sheet.
Line tart shells with six 6-inch parchment rounds. Fill with pie weights. (You can use dried beans or rice if you don't have pie weights.)
Bake tart shells for 12 minutes. Remove parchment paper and pie weights. Continue baking until tart shells are light golden brown, about 4-6 more minutes.
Transfer to cooling rack to cool completely.

Strawberry Cream Filling

Pass the strawberry purée through a mesh sieve to remove large seeds.
In a medium saucepan, simmer the strawberry purée until it's reduced by half. Stir in the sugar and continue cooking over medium heat, until the sugar is dissolved. Transfer to a medium bowl.
Meanwhile, place 3 tablespoons of water into a small bowl. Sprinkle gelatin powder over the top of water. Let sit until water is absorbed, about 5 minutes.
Pour the gelatin mixture into the warm strawberry reduction mixture and stir until fully incorporated.
In a large bowl, beat cream cheese on low speed with an electric mixer until smooth.
Add extracts and beat until combined.
Add the strawberry reduction mixture to the cream cheese a little at time. Beat until well combined.
In a medium bowl, beat heavy whipping cream with an electric mixer at high speed until stiff peaks form.
Fold whipped cream into strawberry mixture.
Spoon into cooled tart shells. Smooth tops with a small offset spatula. Refrigerate for two hours. Garnish with sliced, fresh strawberries.

Notes

*To find the tart pans I used, click here.

Keyword strawberry, tarts