Microwave Every Ingredient in This Croquembush
Holiday entertainment is all about getting the most out of it with the least amount of effort. It’s hard enough to beat the huge pile of caramel-sprinkled profiteroles just for drama, but the powerful croquembush isn’t an easy dish unless you’re using the microwave.
Microwaves are very popular here, if the results are really good – not ok, not bearable and certainly not “hey, that’s not terrible!” They should work the same or better than traditional cooking, and I am happy to inform you that a microwave croquembush is suitable for every item. Each component is assembled twice as fast as on the stove, and every time it comes out perfectly. Best of all, with the exception of caramel, every bit of it can be prepared in advance.
If for some reason the cake display tower isn’t your jam, choose the pieces that suit you. Use brew for gougères or eclairs; add heavy cream and (salty!) butter to the still hot caramel for an incredible homemade caramel sauce; eat pastry cream with a spoon, I don’t care. The quantities listed below have made a great choice for two, but if you want to go up, double or triple everything.
Pastry cream
I desperately wanted my usual pissed-off and run-until-thick technique to work here, but it didn’t have to. Pastry cream is a custard, but unlike citrus curds and sweet potato tarts , starch is the main stabilizer; eggs are needed only for wealth. Starch adamantly resists dissolving evenly in most solutions, so you’ll have to forcefully crush them with something greasy before adding any liquid. This ensures that every starch particle is coated with fat when it swells, which prevents the formation of lumps in the mixture. (Imagine a sauce thickened with roux or beer , then imagine a sauce thickened with a spoonful of raw flour. The principle is the same.)
All of this suggests that tempering should not be skipped when cooking cream for baking in the microwave. This is an extra step, but is actually faster than heating an all-in-one grout, and more importantly, the results are flawless.
I’m using Martha Stewart’s Pastry Cream recipe and so should you. Here’s what you need:
- 2 cups whole milk, heavy cream, or half and half
- 1/2 cup sugar
- 4 large egg yolks
- 1/4 cup cornstarch
- A pinch of salt
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- 3 tablespoons salted butter, toasted and chilled to room temperature (optional)
Combine the milk and half the sugar in a large microwave-safe container. Microwave on high power at one minute intervals until it boils; it took four to five minutes in my microwave. In the meantime, use a fork to beat the egg yolks, cornstarch, and remaining sugar in an easy-to-pour medium bowl. (I used a soup container.)
Temper the egg mixture by gradually pouring in about half a glass of hot milk, stirring constantly with a fork. Scrape the eggs back into the hot milk, mix thoroughly with a flexible spatula, and return to the microwave. Heat on high power in 30 second increments, stirring thoroughly, until mixture boils and thickens to a pudding consistency. This should take no more than two minutes.
Add salt, vanilla extract and butter and pass the cream through a fine mesh sieve into a clean bowl. Press the plastic wrap directly onto the surface of the cream and refrigerate completely. It can be stored in the refrigerator for up to three days.
Pâte a Choux
This was my entrance to the world of microwave-baked pastries. The custard is not that complicated, but if you are not distracted at all, you can easily get bored with constant vigorous stirring, step back for a moment and burn the bottom. The microwave makes this nearly impossible.
My recipe comes from the Flavor Bender blog; all I do is change the microwave for a saucepan. This recipe works because it requires more flour than most, which makes the puff stronger. To knead croquembush you will need:
- 450 milliliters (2 cups minimum) water
- 230 g (2 sticks) diced salted butter
- 260 g (1 3/4 cups) all-purpose flour, sifted
- 1/2 teaspoon table salt
- 2 tablespoons sugar
- 450 g (8 or 9 large) eggs
First things first: Preheat oven to 375ºF. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper and place a standard-tip medium piping bag (or a gallon-sized zippered plastic bag) in a tall, narrow glass. Bend the edges of the open bag over the rim to stabilize it.
Pour water into a large microwave-safe measuring container and add butter. (I use 4 liter Anchor Hocking bowls for this.) Microwave on high until the butter melts and the mixture starts to simmer, four to five minutes. While you wait, combine the flour, salt and sugar in a separate bowl.
Pour flour, salt and sugar into the boiling liquid in one go and stir vigorously with a silicone spatula until the mixture turns into balls. Return to the microwave and heat in one minute increments, stirring vigorously each time, until you see oil droplets form on the surface of the dough and the spoon sticks directly into it without toppling over. This is a very important step: if you don’t evaporate enough water here, the brew will be too soft to hold its shape. Give it at least three full minutes in the microwave, although in my case it was closer to six. When fully cooked, set the dough aside for a few minutes to cool before adding the eggs.
While the dough has cooled, break the eggs into an easy-to-pour container and beat gently with a fork until smooth. Gradually pour the eggs into the warm dough, a few tablespoons at a time, whisking vigorously with a spatula between each addition so that each piece of egg is absorbed. Continue until you have a thick, glossy substance that slowly falls out of the spatula in the form of V-shaped ribbons:
Once you reach this point, stop adding eggs and discard any excess.
Scoop the dough into a pastry bag and place about one inch circles on prepared baking sheets . Press down on any pointed parts with a wet finger. Transfer to a hot oven and bake for at least 35–45 minutes; For maximum stability, every corner and crack in every puff should be golden brown. Immediately transfer the cooked puffs to the cooling rack, turn them over and use a toothpick, fork or paring knife to punch a couple of holes in the base. (This will allow excess steam to escape.) Do the same for the rest of the test.
Refrigerated puffs are stored in an airtight container for about two days.
Caramel
Until this weekend, I had never cooked caramel in the microwave, but I knew that this is what people do . I thought I’d throw some sugar in a glass measuring cup, shake the shit out of it, and come out the other side with a perfect, effortless caramel. Since I never make mistakes, this is exactly what happened.
Just kidding! I crystallized four pounds of sugar and cried one day before I broke down and watched a video from Martha Stewart’s website on how to fix a broken caramel. In this video, a friendly man named Thomas accidentally drops a life-changing tip: You can prevent the caramel from crystallizing by closing the lid. Any water that evaporates from the sugar mixture flows back down to ensure even melting. No caramel recipe I’ve read has ever suggested this, and I’ll die crazy with every person who has kept it hidden from me all these years. Save a life – put a lid on the caramel.
Here’s what you need:
- 2 cups granulated sugar
- 2-3 tablespoons of water
- 1 tablespoon lemon juice (optional)
Add sugar and lemon juice, if using, to a 4-cup microwave-safe glass jar. (The melted sugar gets dangerously hot. If you didn’t put it in the oven, don’t use it here.) Add just enough water to create something that looks like wet sand. Cover with a microwave-safe plate and heat on high power for three to five minutes, stirring once or twice, until the mixture is crystal clear and simmering. Remove the plate and continue heating in 30 second increments until the sugar is a shade or two lighter than you would like; it will continue to cook until it cools down. If the sugar starts to crystallize, add another tablespoon of water, put the plate back on, and heat until everything dissolves again.
Be careful – seriously, this will melt the skin – place the jar of caramel on a heat-resistant rack and let it cool for at least ten minutes. Collect chilled baking cream and puff pastry and get ready to build a festive sweet tower.
Assembly
Boil a kettle of water and place the caramel jar in a large ovenproof bowl. Pour boiling water into a bowl until caramel level. This will prevent jamming in the middle of a building.
Line the serving tray with parchment, or reuse the parchment-lined baking sheet on which you baked the puffs. Draw an eight-inch circle in the center of the parchment with a pencil and turn the sheet over; the circle should still be visible. As a Pisces, I took a loose approach to building and wished I hadn’t. Follow the silly circle guys.
Before you start glueing the shit together, willy-nilly shovel the pastry cream into a small-tipped piping bag (or a gallon-sized zippered plastic bag) and poke a hole in the side of each puff with a custard knife or chopstick. … Using a circle, start stacking the dry, empty puffs on top of each other to form a cone. (This is another thing I didn’t do and would really like.)
Once you’re sure the composition is correct, start adding cream to the custard layers. Sprinkle the caramel on the bottom and sides of each filled puff, then press firmly against whatever is below and next to it. If you can get someone to help with this, assembly line style, things will go fast.
When your tower is complete, step back and admire your work. For a finishing touch, use a fork to quickly spray the thin strands of caramel around the croquembush. It should harden into small pieces of powdered sugar, but even if it doesn’t completely harden, more caramel is always better.
Is it practical? Lord, of course not; it is a tower of profiteroles glued together with caramel. But if there is time to make an impractically showy dessert, I definitely think it is now. Make a croquembush for your Christmas or New Year’s Eve party, and be sure to tell your guests that you’ve made it in the microwave. They’ll probably think you’re a genius, but just in case they think you’re completely insane, another puff of cream will shut them up right away.