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Chocolate Eclairs

Chocolate eclairs are pastry shells filled with chocolate cream and topped with chocolate icing.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 12 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and vanilla are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 19,187 recipes. Both carry ethyl caproate, which smells fruity, apple peel. The science ↓

Chocolate Eclairs

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 400°F (200°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Make the choux dough

  1. Preheat the oven to 400°F (200°C).

  2. In a saucepan, combine water, butter, and salt; bring to a boil.

  3. Add flour all at once, stirring until the mixture forms a ball.

  4. Remove the mixture from heat and let it cool slightly.

  5. Beat in eggs one at a time until the batter is smooth.

  6. Spoon the batter onto a baking pan into long narrow shapes, leaving space between each.

  7. Bake the eclairs until golden and puffed.

  8. Cool the eclairs completely.

Make the cream

  1. For the cream, dissolve chocolate in warm water over boiling water.

  2. Gradually add milk to the chocolate mixture and heat until scalded.

  3. Beat the egg in a bowl.

  4. Mix sugar and cornstarch into the beaten egg.

  5. Stir this mixture into the scalded milk and cook over boiling water until thick.

  6. Add salt and vanilla to the cream.

Fill and finish

  1. Fill the cooled eclairs with the cream.

  2. Melt 2 ounces of chocolate for icing.

  3. Frost the tops of the eclairs with the melted chocolate.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Milk + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,187 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

  2. Chocolate + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,020 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

  3. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  4. Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  5. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

Sugar and vanilla barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 35,032 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Eggs
Bind the dough and give the baked shells structure and puff as steam expands them.
All-purpose flour
Starch that gelatinizes with the butter and water to form a dough that holds its shape.
Butter
Adds fat for tenderness and richness in the shell and flavor in the dough.
Cornstarch
Thickens the cream as it cooks, giving it a firm, sliceable body.
Milk
Forms the liquid base of the cream, adding richness and body.
Chocolate
Provides the main flavor of the cream and the icing.

The step that matters

Cooking the cream until thick. Cornstarch thickens only when the mixture reaches a boil and is stirred, so it must cook long enough to lose its raw starch taste and set. Cooking too briefly leaves it thin, while overheating can scorch the milk or curdle the egg.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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