It’s once again time for a Daring Bakers post! Kat of The Bobwhites was our August 2012 Daring Baker hostess who inspired us to have fun in creating pate a choux shapes, filled with crème patisserie or Chantilly cream. We were encouraged to create swans or any shape we wanted and to go crazy with filling flavors allowing our creativity to go wild! I wanted something I could work chocolate into, and ladybugs seemed a good fit.

Things like this are usually filled with pastry cream, but I had some heavy cream to use up and, as it turns out, pastry cream is made with milk. Weird, but so instead I made a chocolate whipped cream. If I made these again, I’ll try a chocolate pastry cream, or a chocolate whipped cream that uses melted chocolate instead of cocoa.

Ingredients:

Pâte à Choux:

• 1/2 cup (1 stick) butter
• 1 cup water
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 4 large eggs
• 1/2 tube of red food coloring gel

Chocolate Whipped Cream:

• 3 cups of whipping cream
• 1 cup powdered sugar
• 1/2 cup baking cocoa

• small handful of chocolate for decorating

Line two baking sheets with parchment and set aside. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees.

In a medium pot, combine the butter, water, and salt. Heat over medium heat until the butter melts, then remove from the stove.

Add all of the flour and stir together well until the mixture begins to pull away from the sides of the pot.

Add the eggs one at a time, beating after each until well combined.

Beat in the red gel, then use a pastry bag to pipe out about 25 heads and 25 bodies. The heads should be balls with approximately 1 centimeter diameter, the bodies should be large circles, 2-2 1/2 inches across.

Didn’t even have a tip in the pastry bag, piping out of the big opening is just way easier than spooning neatly would have been.

Bake until the bodies are puffy and crisp feeling. They should feel pretty hollow, for good reason.

Hollow!

With the red food coloring, it’s hard to tell when they would be browned, but mine took at least 20 minutes I think.

Let the choux sit until completely cooled. When they’re cool, cut the bodies in half, top to bottom, then cut the tops in half down the middle.

Melt the chocolate and draw spots on the lady bugs. This would be a good time to use a plastic squeeze bottle, but mine are in storage so I just dipped the back of a pencil in the chocolate and tried to stencil on round dots.

Sift together the powdered sugar and cocoa powder. Beat the cream until it reaches soft peaks, then continue beating while adding the sugar/cocoa mixture a bit at a time, beating until stiff peaks form. Transfer the whipped cream to a piping bag with a round tip, and fill the bottom halves of the lady bug bodies.

Press a head into the whipped cream, then place the wings back on.

And you’re done! These are best eaten day of, and are pretty cute!

Lady Bug Puffs

Pâte à Choux:

• 1/2 cup (1 stick) butter
• 1 cup water
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 4 large eggs
• 1/2 tube of red food coloring gel

Chocolate Whipped Cream:

• 3 cups of whipping cream
• 1 cup powdered sugar
• 1/2 cup baking cocoa

• small handful of chocolate for decorating

Line two baking sheets with parchment and set aside. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees.

In a medium pot, combine the butter, water, and salt. Heat over medium heat until the butter melts, then remove from the stove. Add all of the flour and stir together well until the mixture begins to pull away from the sides of the pot. Add the eggs one at a time, beating after each until well combined. Beat in the red gel, then use a pastry bag to pipe out about 25 heads and 25 bodies. The heads should be balls with approximately 1 centimeter diameter, the bodies should be large circles, 2-2 1/2 inches across.

Bake until the bodies are puffy, crisp, and hollow feeling. Let cool completely on a wire rack, then cut the bodies in half, top to bottom, then cut the tops in half down the middle.

Melt the chocolate and draw spots on the lady bugs.

Sift together the powdered sugar and cocoa powder. Beat the cream until it reaches soft peaks, then continue beating while adding the sugar/cocoa mixture a bit at a time, beating until stiff peaks form. Transfer the whipped cream to a piping bag with a round tip, and fill the bottom halves of the lady bug bodies.

Press a head into the whipped cream, then place the wings back on.