Choux Pastry at the San Francisco Baking Institute

This little fella is a Paris-Brest, named after the predecessor to the Tour de France. It`s a pastry made from choux, a classic french dough used to make eclairs, gougeres, cream puffs, Parisian Gnocchi and another few dozen other good things…

Today was my first day in a week-long course at the San Francisco Baking Institute. A gift I planned long ago to soften the blow of a milestone birthday hitting me later this week. (I`ll let you guess the number.)

Choux can be tricky. It`s one of those things that is a little different everytime you make it…here, our instructor, Juliette, is showing us what a ready-to-go choux dough looks like: Smooth and shiny, and drops from the spoon in a nice, even V.

We also learned the professional way to load up a piping bag, and how to pipe even, consistent eclairs.  Tomorrow we get to fill them…