There’s a restaurant in town that Trevor and I absolutely love (and are frequent patrons of) – it’s called Court Street. It’s steps off the main drag in Hoboken and from the outside, you wouldn’t think it’s anything special. But if you come and visit and don’t eat at Court Street, you will be missing out on a very special experience.
Not only does Court Street have some of the best service in town, but the specials menu is the size of most restaurants regular menu. And, the specials are AMAZING. What’s even better is they have an in-house pastry chef who makes the best desserts. Sometimes, we just go for dessert after a long day because we know how good it’s going to be.
My favorite dessert they make, and one they are known for, are the profiteroles. They serve you three enormous profiterole pastries stuffed with ice cream, whipped cream and drizzled with chocolate sauce. Can you tell how good these are just by my excitement in writing about them?!
For Mother’s Day and the 1 year anniversary of Season Generously (!!!!), I decided to take a stab at making profiteroles. While they sound easy to make, making choux (pronounced SHOE) pastry is quite tricky. It’s a paste-like dough cooked on the stove and baked in the oven. It’s very very light if you get it right and very very dense if you get it wrong.
This is my way of making them (adapted from the Barefoot Contessa’s original recipe) and it never fails!
Profiteroles
Ingredients
- 1 cup milk
- 1 stick unsalted butter
- Pinch of kosher salt
- 1 cup all-purpose flour
- 4 extra-large eggs
- 1/2 cup heavy cream
- 8 ounces chocolate chips
- Good vanilla ice cream or whipped cream*, for serving
Directions
- Preheat the oven to 425 degrees.
- Heat the milk, butter, and salt over medium heat until it reaches a rolling boil. When the butter is melted, add the flour all at once and beat it with a wooden spoon until the mixture comes together and forms a dough. Cook, stirring constantly, over low heat for 2 minutes. Dump the hot mixture into the bowl of a food processor fitted with the steel blade. Add the eggs and pulse until the eggs are incorporated into the dough and the mixture is thick (I’ve tried this step by hand and you end up scrambling the eggs, so the food processor is a really important step).
- Spoon the mixture into a pastry bag fitted with a large plain round tip or a ziploc bag with the tip cut off. Pipe in mounds 1-1/2 inches wide and 1 inch high onto a baking sheet lined with parchment paper. With a wet finger, lightly press down the swirl at the top of each puff.
- Bake for 20 minutes, or until lightly browned, then turn off the oven and allow them to sit for another 6-8 minutes, until they sound hollow when tapped on the bottom. Make a small slit in the side of each puff (in the same place you’ll eventually cut them in half) to allow the steam to escape. Set aside to cool.
- For the chocolate sauce, place the cream and chocolate chips in a bowl set over simmering water and stir just until the chocolate melts and is smooth. Set aside.
- For serving, cut each profiterole in half crosswise, fill with a small scoop of ice cream or whipped cream*, replace the top, and drizzle with slightly warm chocolate sauce. Enjoy immediately!
Season Generously 