Comments on: sugar puffs

By: jean

jean — Tue, 26 May 2009 03:40:18 +0000

Oh no, I wish I had read the comments before making these last night! I was doing fine and got a ball of dough, but when i added the eggs, the batter became really runny. I added more flour but it didnt really help in the puffing. My poor little wannabe-puffs puffed up slightly in the oven but collasped the moment I took them out of the heat. I ended up with sugar-topped pancakes!! No one in my family likes pancakes, so I ate them all by myself *cue miserable pout*

haha but now with these new tips I shall try again tonight! hopefully they puff up this time!

By: Susan from Portland, OR

Susan from Portland, OR — Fri, 15 May 2009 21:42:09 +0000

First of all — I love smittenkitchen! I just last night finally got through all the archives.
Secondly, if I may offer some advice to those here who have had difficulties with this recipe…
I was excited to see this recipe because I love these when I buy them at a fancy little coffeeshop, and I was looking forward to making them at home. When I read through the recipe, I realized it was VERY VERY SIMILAR to the middle layer of a recipe I’ve made before called “Danish Puff Pastry” (from an old Betty Crocker cookbook). I ended up making two batches of this becuase the first batch didn’t make a ball of dough (which it seems was the problem for several other people). I was confused greatly because I’ve never had a problem with the Danish Puff Pastry. I double checked that old recipe and found that it had very similar ratios (namely 1 cup water to 1 cup flour). HOWEVER, the Danish Puff Pastry recipe reads: “Heat margarine and water to rolling boil; remove from heat. Quickly stir in flour. Stir vigorously over low heat until mixture forms a ball, about 1 minute; remove from heat.” When I made my second batch of this recipe, and followed the Danish Puff Pastry instructions (that is, have water at rolling boil, and kept stirring — it does take about a minute), a ball of dough formed that didn’t stick to the pan, and the end results were perfect, and looked just like Deb’s pictures. Maybe if you guys try making them again with boiling water, it’ll work out. I know I’ve never had any problems making the Danish Puff Pastry, and again, the second batch of sugar puffs came out perfectly.
And for the record, I tried fixing my soupy first batch of dough by heating it up on the stove, and while I did eventually get a ball of dough that looked right, the end results were all wrong. They didn’t puff at all, so I just had little disks. They were yummy, and I ate them, they just weren’t, you know, PUFFS.
Hope this helps.

By: Jessica

Jessica — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 17:08:23 +0000

I really think it’s true that there’s something wrong with this recipe. Deb, any chance you could take another look at it? Seriously, if you combine 1 c water and 1 c flour and 6 T butter, that ratio does not equal the clingy dough you picture. It just doesn’t! Thanks!

By: Aubrey

Aubrey — Thu, 02 Apr 2009 16:48:53 +0000

This recipe is awful!
First of all, they are so bland and boring.
It’s too difficult to brush the egg whites onto the moist little puffs before you cook them.
They turned out looking perfect, they were really cute. But so bland and boring. Not worth making at all.

By: Nan

Nan — Mon, 30 Mar 2009 18:14:18 +0000

I had the same problem very very runny. But then the recipe up top which I printed out said nothing about keeping it on the heat low OR boiling the mixture. I guess that is where I went wrong. I took it word for word. I ended up with a gigantic eggy runny mess and no eggs left in the house. Nightmare!

I will try again when I’m over it. Which I’m clearly not. My little 5 year old kept checking the oven saying ‘no puff there, nope, no puff’. rub it in!!!

By: Megan

Megan — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 21:34:36 +0000

The recipe sounds so simple when first read but I found it quite challenging. I made the first batch before reading the comments below and ended up with eggy muffins. Yuck!

But after a couple more batches of trial and error, I found these hints very helpful:
1. BOIL water, butter, sugar, and salt. The mixture can be removed from heat when flour is added.
2. I used 3 eggs instead of 4 in the batter to avoid over eggy-ness and runny batter.
3. I used to baking stone on the lowest rack when baking.
4. I experimented with chocolate, white chocolate, and peanut butter chips. They all burned the first 2 trials but the chocolate chips were perfect in the 3rd when I added them halfway through the baking process. (The others still burned.)

Hope this helps!

By: Graciela

Graciela — Mon, 23 Feb 2009 21:23:24 +0000

So I’ve made these 3 times now and here are some things that worked for me and might be helpful to others. 1.) I only used 3 eggs instead of 4 to avoid some of the runny batter and a crazy eggy taste. 2.) I brought the water and butter to a rolling boil and I did this in both a stainless steel sauce pan and a nonstick. The stainless steel works much better. 3.) I mixed the flour into the water/butter mixture while it was still on the stove, but with the flame off. 4.) I swapped out a couple of spoonfuls of APF for 100% Whole Wheat Pastry Flour, but still kept the overall flour measurement to 1 cup. 5.) My oven was very, very hot, which I read on another site is helpful in making these. I put the Chouquettes into the oven well past the preheat buzzer went off.

One of my batters didn’t pull away into a smooth ball, but rather, was more like a very thick pudding but it still puffed up. Maybe not perfectly but I was able to fill them with pastry cream.

By: Rebecca

Rebecca — Tue, 17 Feb 2009 00:26:49 +0000

Wonderful! Thanks for the added info about “simmer” it made all the difference. These are so easy and so delicious!

By: Margaret Spear

Margaret Spear — Mon, 16 Feb 2009 04:24:43 +0000

chocolate and zucchini:

“Make sure you have all the ingredients measured out before you start. Combine the butter, salt, sugar, and 1 cup (240 mL) fresh water in a small saucepan, and bring to a simmer over medium heat. Remove from heat, add the flour all at once, and stir quickly with a wooden spoon until well blended. Return the pan over medium-low heat and keep stirring until the mixture forms a smooth ball that pulls away from the sides of the pan”

see, simmer, aka boil. you. must. do. this.

By: Margaret Spear

Margaret Spear — Mon, 16 Feb 2009 04:16:30 +0000

Oh, no, you left out two really, really important things. I feel so bad for the people who had problems, and especially for the ones who then blamed it on themselves. I have made these occasionally for over thirty years so I know something about how to do it wrong and how to do it right. You absolutely must bring the water and butter to a boil. You absolutely must cook them until the tops are dry, dry, dry. If you mess up the first thing, some won’t form their bottoms right when they cook and there will be holes which is a danged inconvenience if you’re planning to fill them with custard. Additionally, they won’t puff up all perky. They will be rounded and, not to be unduly critical because, hey, you are the one with the cooking blog, but the ones in your photographs are not exactly perky. If you mess up the second thing, they will collapse as they cool, which is disappointing for looks and also because they will be a bit damp instead of crispy crunchy knock your socks off perky. Again, I know I’m not the blogger here, but it would be nice if you’d let all those disappointed cooks know it’s not their fault.