Gateau Saint Honore

Rightly or wrongly, I am a little bit chuffed at this one. Not because it tasted the best, but because after many failed attempts, this is the first time choux pastry worked for me! The recipe is from James Martin's "Desserts" and the first thing you might notice is that his instructions conflict between the top step by step "immediately add the eggs" and the bottom highlighted section "allow to cool before adding the eggs". On the grounds I didn't want scrambled eggs, I asked my sister to have a look at our good ol' Good Housekeeping book which said to cool slightly :P

So that's a choux pastry base and puffs. Mr Martin appears to omit the crucial stage of choux which is to pierce and return to the oven to dry out. Fortunately, online he appears to have amended this faux pas!

What else do you need to know? The cream is whipped double cream folded with custard and orange flower water since I didn't have any suitable liqueur. I have two tiny blisters on my fingers from attempting to dip the buns in caramel. The caramel burnt a little bit too much and detracted from the taste of the cake... and oh, the cake looked better with the half ice cream scoops of cream in the centre, but I had a piping back so it just seemed a waste of all the extra cream... Overall, still chuffed.

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