Corgi Chocolate Choux Pastry

My friend requested for some corgi and Jigglypuff choux pastries that I can make at my convenience. Since I had a cancellation for an order, I decided to take time to make these. Presenting my corgis in the form of chocolate éclairs!

Woof! The Jigglypuff choux pastries are in a separate blog post 

You may use any favourite choux pastry recipe but I used the one in this blog post for the batter and craquelin. I use craquelin to control the shape of the expansion as well as provide an extra crunch.

Piped batter on perforated mat (highly recommended for better shape retention.) . I pipe a short éclair for corgi body using a 18mm diameter open star tip and a plain round 15mm tip for 2.5cm rounds for Jigglypuff body

Placing craquelin on top. As a rule of thumb, I made the craquelin about 5 mm wider than piped batter. 

I usually bake the pastry cases until really dry and crisp so that the recipient can have the option of whether to have them crisp or softer by varying the amount of time the filling sits inside the cases.

I bake the corgi ears and tail using batter too. Just transfer batter into piping bag with a small hole cut and pipe onto parchment paper lined baking trays. For small choux parts, I don't use perforated mat as it is not necessary.

Bake these for only 10 min or so. Do keep a close watch on them or they burn fast in the oven. 

After the baked cases have cooled completely, I insert or glue on the small parts with royal icing or melted chocolate.

Partially assembled Jigglypuff and corgi! 

The white part of the corgi is piped on using white chocolate melted with a little vegetable shortening. I used white chocolate chips for the legs.  The fine features in black, red and pink were done using royal icing.

I cut a hole at the base of the pastry case for ease of filling with chocolate pastry cream that is made richer with dark chocolate couverture added and made lighter in texture with whipped cream added.

Chocolate pastry cream with whipped cream added 
Ingredients :
20g cornflour
30g caster sugar
12g cocoa powder
2 egg yolks
200g + 15g milk
1/2tsp vanilla extract
1/2tsp kahlua coffee liqueur (optional)
Pinch of salt
15g unsalted butter
60g dark chocolate couverture (or any dark chocolate you like, finely chopped)
85g cold whipping cream (I used a combination of dairy and non-dairy whipping cream. You can choose to use either. )

Steps:
1. Sift together cocoa powder and cornflour into a heatproof heavy bowl. Add sugar and whisk together. Add egg yolks and 15g of milk and whisk until a smooth paste is formed. Set aside.

2. Heat 200g milk, vanilla, salt and coffee liqueur (if using) in a saucepan until the milk just starts to bubble at the edges.

3. Remove saucepan from heat and pour in a thin stream into the egg yolk mixture while whisking. Start off pouring very slowly before pouring faster. This is to temper the egg yolks.

4. Pour the mixture back into the saucepan and heat over medium-low heat while whisking all the time. Once mixture starts to thicken, remove from heat and whisk until mixture becomes smooth again. Return to heat and keep whisking as the pastry cream thickens until your preferred consistency. Keep in mind the pastry cream will be firmer upon cooling.

5. Remove from heat and add butter and dark chocolate couverture. Whisk until butter is melted and incorporated. Transfer custard to a bowl and press a piece of cling wrap on the surface of pastry cream to prevent skin from forming. Refrigerate for an hour or until cool. You may prepare this a day ahead of time.

6. Beat cold whipping cream using electric mixer until firm or stiff peaks form (be careful not to overbeat if using full dairy whipping cream) . Take the chilled pastry cream out from the fridge and stir to loosen it. Fold in the whipped cream into the pastry cream in a few batches.

If you would like to know what other designs you can make with choux pastries, checkout my Deco Choux Pastries book!

With love,
Phay Shing