Raspberry Eclairs

Chocolate profiteroles are my absolute favourite pudding and therefore as a close relation to the éclair I am surprised I have never attempted to make them before. Perhaps I was put off by the challenge of it as I think even the French say that they are hard to make, I might have made that up but either way these were a first for me.

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Ingredients;

For the pastry
75g butter
100g plain flour
2 eggs
225ml water

For the icing
50g raspberries
125g icing sugar

Method;

Preheat your oven to 180 degrees (fan oven)
Line a large baking tray with greaseproof paper
In a saucepan melt the butter with 225ml of water. Once the butter has melted and the mixture has started to boil remove from the heat and quickly add in the flour and beat until its a glossy mix and doesn't stick to the pan. transfer to a large bowl and leave to cool for 10 minutes.
Using a hand held whisk beat in the eggs until you have a sticky paste. Spoon the mixture into a piping bag and squeeze so that you have a 12cm line, two lines thick. Make sure there is sufficient space between the eclairs, pat down any peaks with a damp finger.
Bake for 30 mins.
Remove from the oven and very carefully cut horizontally leaving one side still in tact. return to the oven for 5 mins to dry out.
Leave to cool once done and start prepping the icing.

Place the raspberries in a fine sieve and squeeze them over your bowl of icing sugar so that you don't have any seeds in the mixture. Mix the raspberry juice in with the sugar to form a sweet pink mixture.

Add the cream to the eclairs and then ice the top layer. Add petals, dried fruit if using and that's it!

Now before I make anything I like to get everything weighed out and prepped as I am a nerd and also it makes life easier so that you are not faffing about with the hand whisk when your butter is melting and before you know there has been a kitchen disaster. Because everything about eclairs are so precise I measured out the éclair sizing on the baking paper so I knew where to pipe the mixture.

The piping bit was verrrry satisfying. If there are any peaks just smooth down with a damp finger.

I found the recipe in my Country Life magazine and although I would never order a raspberry éclair because I am basic and would always go for the traditional chocolate, I thought these looked so mouth wateringly good and also being raspberry it meant I was making healthier choices, lol.

 Everything was going swimmingly up until I removed them from the oven and then I had to cut them in half, they are so delicate I pretty much destroyed most of them, thankfully with the icing it does cover a multitude of sins but despite the fact the method said I needed to saw them in half so they could dry out I think it might have been better just to let them cool then make a small hole at one end to fill them with cream. Get your mind out of the gutter folks!

I must confess, I cheated and didn't bother to make the cream filling..lets blame lockdown and say that I couldn't get all of the ingredients that I needed.  That's my story and I am sticking to it. In truth, I didn't have the rosewater but im not sure how much of a difference that makes.

Mine ended up looking a little like sticky willy buns but they were fun to make and now I can tick that off my baking repertoire.

I have used some edible rose petals and dried strawberry flakes but you could use raspberries or just leave the icing plain.