Strawberry Cream Puffs

Copyright 2007 by Cooking With The Single Guy

Ingredients:
1 package (10 oz.) frozen puff pastry shells (6 shells)
7 to 8 fresh strawberries
¾ cup crème anglaise (recipe below)
powdered sugar for dusting

Preheat oven to 400 degrees

Remove the pastry shells from packaging and place on non-stick or parchment-lined cookie sheet. Bake per instructions and then set aside to cool.

Assemble your cream puffs by removing the cap of your puff pastry shell, adding a tablespoon of crème anglaise inside and filling with sliced strawberries. Place the cap back on top (optional) and dust with powdered sugar.

Makes 6 cream puffs.

TIP: You can bake as many shells as you plan to eat, so don’t feel like you have to make all the puffs at once. Refrigerate your crème anglaise and strawberries and then bring them out to assemble your puffs as you bake them when you want.

Crème anglaise:

½ pint heavy cream
1 t vanilla extract
2 T sugar
3 egg yolks
1 T Kahlua or other liqueur

Warm heavy cream in a small saucepan until it’s almost boiling.

In another saucepan, whisk egg yolks with sugar and vanilla extract. Whip well until mixture turns into a pale yellow and creates thick ribbons (about 3 to 5 minutes). Pour the warm milk slowly into the egg mixture and blend well.

Place saucepan with all the ingredients over medium heat and cook until thick custard forms, stirring occasionally. About 10 to 15 minutes. Remove from heat and add Kahlua. Then cover and refrigerate until ready to use.

Makes ¾ cup.

TIP: When adding the warm milk to egg, drizzle just a little at a time while stirring the eggs at the same time. This is called “tempering” the eggs and the slow drizzle prevents the eggs from turning into scrambled eggs.

BERRIES AND CREAM: The crème anglaise you make above is used to make the cream puffs. But it taste just as great by itself and you can simply drizzle it on fresh berries for a quick dessert or make a slice of pie extra special by drizzling the crème anglaise on top.