Cream Horns With Creme Chantilly

My first attempt at proper patisserie wasn’t as scary as I had imagined.  It was a technical and methodical process which was surprisingly quite calming – I caught myself humming once or twice.  It was actually quite a pleasant overall experience.  Especially as they turned out pretty good.

I first saw these moulds in my local TK Maxx store.  I love prowling around this store for unique and sometimes the most irreverent baking equipment.  You don’t realise you need a lime squeezer, egg slicer, egg white separator, avocado holder and an elongated fish slice until you see one.  Surprisingly I use all these fairly regularly now that I have them, especially the lovely long fish slice.

These moulds caught my eye because I had been wanting to try something more on the patisserie side rather than cake for a while now and I know that whipped cream or crème Chantilly (the traditional filling for cream horns) is a favourite with my folks.  I always have puff pastry in the freezer so thought it couldn’t be that hard.

And it wasn’t.  It was a bit fiddly getting the strips of pastry onto the moulds but once you get the hang of it things go pretty smoothly.  I didn’t use egg wash, just some water to make them adhere once on the moulds.  Once the strips are on they are wetted with some water on a pastry brush then sprinkled with granulated sugar (I used Demerara too).

These look like a forest of golden fir trees.

I stood them up in the oven which might not have been such a good idea as the weight of the pastry made it sink as they baked and puffed up.  

I later looked online at tutorials (I know I should have done this before making them) and they had the moulds lying down when placed in the oven. 

You’d think I would have learned my lesson and do this the second time I tried these, but I just wanted the puff to be even all over and not flat on the side which would be lying down, so I didn’t.  I thought I would just make the pastry strips stick better by pressing down on them more firmly.  Unfortunately this didn’t work and yet again there were some moulds on which the pastry sank down.

The next time I’m keeping these on their sides in the oven.

After these cooled I spooned in a little raspberry jam then piped in some crème Chantilly – which was so much fun.  Again I have to mention that making these is a very enjoyable process. Eating them even more so.

I think the combination of raspberry and crème Chantilly is an excellent one with the puff pastry but next time I want to try these lined with some melted chocolate or ganache and with chocolate flavoured whipped cream.  Hmmm.

Cream Horns with Crème Chantilly

(makes about 10)

·         500g puff pastry

·         Granulated or Demerara sugar for sprinkling

·         600ml double cream

·         1 vanilla pod, scraped and seeded

·         4 tbsp icing sugar (or more/less to taste)

·         Raspberry jam (about half a jar)

Prepare about 10 cream horn moulds by rubbing them with a little butter.

Roll out the puff pastry into a rectangle about – you will be cutting one inch strips from this so try to judge it by this.

Slice the rectangle lengthways into roughly one inch strips.  Take the mould and wrap the strip around it making sure the strip is overlapping itself as you go down the mould.

Once all the strips have been used, wet the pastry on the moulds with water on a pastry brush.  Then, holding it over a large plate or tray (to catch the sugar), drizzle the sugar over the pastry so that it is evenly coated.

Place on a baking tray and bake at 200 C for about 30-35 minutes.  Once out of the oven, allow to cool on the tray.

To de-mould these, squeeze the mould slightly so that the pastry case pops away from it.  The moulds for cream horns should have this flexibility inbuilt to allow this.

Drizzle in some seedless raspberry jam with a teaspoon, or in a piping bag fitted with a narrow nozzle.  Try to spread the jam all over the inside and not too thickly – there shouldn't be so much that it drizzles out.

Whip the cream with the vanilla pod a little.  Add in the icing sugar and whip until medium-stiff peaks – make sure not to over whip and turn the cream into butter (I find that once you’ve got to the stage where the cream is starting to peak, stop using an electric whisk and do it gently by hand so that you have more control and don’t over-whisk).

Scoop the cream into a large piping bag fitted with a medium star nozzle (not really necessary if you don’t have one) and pipe into the pastry cases.

Bakewell Tart Traybake

What do you do when you have a large surplus of shortcrust pastry in the freezer?  Devise sweet ways of using it of course.

We’ve been making a lot of things with this pastry, both savoury and sweet, mainly quiches, but this is one of my favourites and just so easy to make.   

The only thing you’re making from scratch really is the almond sponge as both pastry and jam are ready made.  I did freshly grind the almonds though, instead of using pre ground almonds from a packet.  I think it gives a more crumbly texture to the cake, as freshly ground almonds aren't as fine as those from a packet.  Well, mines aren't anyway.

I went for this recipe because I love this combination of raspberry jam and almond sponge.  Do you know those Raspberry and Almond Bake slices you get in Costas?  Well that is what I order every time I nip in for some latte and that was the taste that I wanted to achieve here too.

I think I managed to achieve it with this flavour combination although the texture of the Costas treat is a lot denser than this.  You don’t have to use raspberry jam for a Bakewell, any flavour is acceptable so just choose what you like.   

Did I mention this is so easy to do?  Just roll out your pastry until it fits into a 30cm by 40 cm baking tray.  Spread over the jam, then the sponge mixture and bake.   

The hardest part of the whole recipe is judging the baking time – if you take out the bake too early you might get a raw pastry bottom, but if you take it out too late you might over bake the cake.  I found about 30 minutes in the oven at 180C was just enough to bake all the pastry and not dry out the cake.

I do think that the addition of almond essence really helps give this sponge an almond kick though, so try to incorporate that if you have some lying around.  Also, I didn’t use sweet shortcrust pastry, just the normal unsweetened kind and I loved the way the plain pastry tasted against the sweet jam and sponge.

Bakewell Tart Traybake (adapted from here)

·         500g shortcrust pastry

·         250g raspberry jam (I used half a 454g jar but you can use more to create a thicker layer of jam)

·         200g butter, softened

·         200 caster sugar

·         ¼ tsp almond essence  

·         4 eggs

·         100g plain flour

·         1 tsp baking powder

·         100g freshly ground almonds

Preheat the oven to 180C, prepare a 30cm x 40cm baking tray.

Roll out the pastry until it just fits into the baking tray – it doesn’t have to be exact but try to make it bigger rather than smaller so that you can fit it up the sides.

Beat the butter, sugar and almond essence together until light and fluffy.  Add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition.

Combine the flour, baking powder and ground almonds together and fold these into the butter mixture.

Spread the jam over the pastry, spreading it as evenly as possible with the back of a teaspoon.

Spread the almond sponge mixture over the jam layer trying to cover it as much as possible so that it doesn’t show.

Bake for about 30 minutes.  Allow to cool in tin before slicing.