Keroppi Matcha Custard Cream Puff

I made these Matcha Keroppi choux pastries along with the black sesame koala choux pastries :)

Oops! We may be a little sunburnt but we taste awesome! It's better to err on the side of higher temperature than risk letting your pastry case collapse 

I had some leftover matcha cookie dough from making turtle matcha cream puffs so I decided to make more Matcha cream puffs to use up the cookie dough. They taste really yummy anyway so these were very well received. Here's a closer peek at the crisp pastry case cross section and smooth, creamy matcha custard...

You may refer to this post for the recipe for Matcha custard and the matcha cookie dough. Prepare the pastry cream and cookie dough (Craquelin) before you begin working on the Choux pastry case.

Smooth matcha and black sesame custard!

Recipe for Choux pastry case
Ingredients (makes about 14 Keroppi):
75g water
75g milk
75g butter
5g sugar
5g salt
90g bread flour
10g plain flour
150g eggs (approximately 3, lightly beaten)

Note: you may replace all plain flour with bread flour, or some bread flour with plain flour. Plain flour gives the pastry a more tender bite whereas bread flour helps to give more strength to the structure and makes it more crispy

Steps:
1. Sift together plain and bread flour into a bowl. Preheat oven to 180℃ and set oven rack to middle position. Cut out matcha cookie dough into oval shapes, place on baking tray lined with parchment paper and freeze it.

2. Place water, milk, sugar, salt and butter into a saucepan. Bring to a boil while stirring. Remove from heat and pour the flour in all at once. Mix well to make sure all the flour absorb the liquid.

3. Return the dough to cook over medium low heat for about 2 minutes. Remove from heat and continue to knead the dough with a spatula in a bowl to let it cool for a couple of minutes.

4. Gradually add beaten egg and mix well after each addition. The batter is ready when it appears shiny and yet leaves a trough that doesn't collapse when you run a finger across the batter surface.

5. Transfer into piping bag fitted with a Wilton #12 (or larger) tip. Pipe an oval for the head. Gently place the cookie cutout on top of the piped pastry.

I was working on these Matcha Choux at the same time as the koala choux

6. Bake at 180℃ for 20 min. Reduce temperature to 160℃ and bake for another 20 min. Turn off the heat and let it cool for 10 min in the oven. You may sprinkle a little water around the piped batter before baking to help the pastry to rise more in the oven. Pierce the side with toothpick to release any steam. Cool completely on cooling rack. Note that baking temperature and time is dependent on individual ovens. Extend baking time if need be to thoroughly dry out the cases.

Freshly baked Choux pastry case!

I used white candy melts as the eyes and added on the black details using melted dark chocolate with charcoal powder added. Stick the eyes on using melted white chocolate. The rosy cheeks are melted white chocolate with a bit of pink gel food colouring added. Wait for the chocolate to set before filling the shells.

You may fill the pastry case by poking a hole at the bottom and inserting a piping bag filled with custard and fitted with a small piping tip. Best to fill the cases just before consuming so that you can enjoy the texture at its best. This is one of the traditional ways of filling choux pastry cases but I find that sometimes you end up under filling or overfilling the cases. I will share in my subsequent blog posts another way of filling the Choux pastry case that allows you to be absolutely sure that you filled the cases to the max without bursting it, and without making any cuts on the decorated top surface. Stay tuned!

With love,
Phay Shing