Gougeres! Puffs with delicious gruyere cheese. They’re meant for an appetizer but I find as soon as they come out of the oven I eat them straight off the pan. If they’re not piped perfectly circular, this is an instance where it actually adds to the character of these treats. Rustic and no-fuss.

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A family of cream puff swans! I’ve made these before and loved the process of assembling the different choux components to make these pretty pastry creatures. Dusted with powdered sugar it looks like the splashing/rippling in the water.

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Doing a bit of catch up on my posting. I just finished up the Pate a Choux chapter in the Bouchon Bakery cookbook. The choux dough for Eclairs is also used for the Swans and Paris-Brest so I made one batch and went to town piping different shapes.

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I tried a couple of versions of the Paris-Brest in Paris, which inspired the one I made this week using the recipe from the Bouchon Bakery cookbook. Thomas Keller’s take on the pastry incorporates peanut butter in the pastry cream for an American flair.

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After making cream puffs last week from the Bouchon Bakery cookbook, this week’s project involved cream puffs and fondant to make a stacked puff that in the book is named Miss Daisy because she has little fondant daisies on her ensemble. I made mine Parisian and gave her a chocolate fondant petticoat with pearl button closures and a beret. Her bag doesn’t resemble any designer in particular but I’ll just say it’s a Birkin bag. The inspiration for the theme came from Chef Dominique Ansel.

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