Vanilla Cream Puffs, Camp Version
Choux baked in a dutch oven, filled with vanilla pudding made from powdered milk.
- calories
- 420
- weight
- 4.5 oz
- cal / oz
- 93
- protein
- 9 g
- serves
- 4, scales
- prep
- 30 min
- cook
- 35 min
- total time
- 65 min
- water
- 250 ml boiled
- cost
- $$
Calorie and protein figures are my own estimates, good enough for planning a food bag and not meant as precise nutrition data.
- Dessert
- Dutch oven
- Campfire coals
- Car camping
- Basecamp
- Vegetarian
- Nut free
- Real dishes
- Pre-mix at home
- Shelf stable
- Actual cooking
Ingredients
| Water | 1 dl (100 ml) | |
|---|---|---|
| Butter | 50 g | a stick of unsalted keeps a week out of the cooler in cool weather |
| All-purpose flour | 70 g | about 1/2 cup, measured at home |
| Salt | a pinch | |
| Eggs | 2 to 3 | carry in a hard egg case; stop adding when the dough turns glossy |
| Whole milk powder | 5 tbsp | reconstitutes to about 2 dl of milk |
| Egg yolks | 2 | |
| Cornstarch | 2 tbsp | |
| Sugar | 3 tbsp | |
| Vanilla bean | 1 | or 1 tsp extract in a dropper bottle |
| Heavy cream powder | 3 tbsp | whips thin; folding it in is enough |
| Powdered sugar | 1 tbsp | for dusting |
Method
- Make the pastry cream first so it has time to cool. Whisk the yolks, sugar, and cornstarch in a mug until there are no lumps.
- Stir the milk powder into 200 ml of water in a small pot. Split the vanilla bean, scrape the seeds in, and drop the pod in too. Bring it just to a boil over a low flame.
- Pour the hot milk into the yolk mixture in a thin stream, whisking the whole time, then tip it all back into the pot.
- Cook over low heat, stirring without stopping, until it thickens and coats the spoon. Pull the pod out and set the pot in a creek or a cold water bath to chill.
- For the dough, bring 100 ml of water and the butter to a boil in the dutch oven set over the stove or a low bed of coals.
- Dump in the flour and salt all at once and beat it with a wooden spoon, still over the heat, for two minutes. It is ready when it pulls into a ball and leaves a film on the bottom.
- Move it off the heat and beat in one egg at a time, working each one in completely before the next. Stop when the dough is glossy and holds a soft peak. That may be two eggs, not three.
- Wipe the oven, line it with parchment, and spoon out 4 cm mounds with room between them.
- Bake at roughly 180 C: coals underneath, about twice as many on the lid. Thirty to thirty-five minutes. Do not lift the lid early or they collapse.
- Whisk the cream powder with 3 tbsp cold water, fold it into the cold pastry cream, poke a hole in the base of each puff, and spoon or pipe the filling in. Dust with powdered sugar.
Choux only works because the dough is cooked twice. Boiling the flour into the butter and water gelatinizes the starch, which lets the dough hold far more egg than a batter normally would. That water turns to steam in the oven and blows each puff hollow. The hollow is the point: it is where the filling goes.
Adapted for a dutch oven and no cooler. Fresh milk and cream become powders, which is honest here because both are being cooked or folded anyway. Eggs are the one thing that cannot be swapped, so carry them in a hard case and count on losing one. The oven temperature is the hard part on coals: aim for steady rather than hot, keep the lid down the whole time, and err toward overbaked. An underbaked puff falls flat the moment air hits it.
Packing
Flour, salt, sugar, cornstarch, milk powder, and cream powder each go in their own labeled bag, measured at home. Butter and eggs ride in a hard case at the top of the food bag. Parchment cut to the size of your oven, folded flat.
Variations
- Skip the pastry cream and fill with the whipped cream powder alone. Faster, and one less pot.
- Vanilla extract in place of the bean saves fuss, though the flavor is flatter.
- Melted chocolate over the tops instead of powdered sugar, if you have a spare pot lid to melt it in.
https://meny.no/oppskrifter/dessert/vannbakkels-med-vaniljekrem