This recipe for homemade eclairs is easy to make, pipe, fill, and assemble, making them a delicious French dessert at home. The dough used to make cream can be used to make eclairs, and they can be piped using either a plain tip or a star tip. To ensure neat, burst-free eclairs, use a star nozzle tip with a ½ inch diameter. Bismarck tip or small sharp tips like Ateco 16 or 352 are recommended.
To prepare the eclair recipe, you need only three elements: choux pastry buns, your filling of choice, and the glaze. Choux pastry is a versatile ingredient that can be filled with cream and topped with fondant icing. There are many variations for toppings, but making a simple and quick eclair recipe is essential.
When piping choux pastry into eclairs, use a French star nozzle to reduce cracking and maintain a neater, more consistent shape as it bakes. If you don’t have a French star nozzle, an open star nozzle is the next best option. A standard round tip is used for both eclairs and profiteroles.
A disposable piping bag and a Star nozzle (Size 13-15) can be used to fill up the bag with the entire choux pastry. The use of plain and star nozzles is up to you. The single most important way to reduce cracking in éclairs and ensure they are puffy instead of flat is to use the proper piping tip.
For a quicker filling, fold lemon curd through whipped cream or use pre-made premium custard. For a richer chocolate twist, replace the royal icing with a French star tip with lots of dents.
📹 Best Chocolate Eclair Recipe
This ridiculously delicious chocolate eclair recipe made from airy choux pastry filled with vanilla pastry cream and dipped in …
📹 (Subtitle) Star Piping Nozzle Tutorial for Beginners :: Recommended, How to Pipe, comparison
*This is the nozzle number introduced in the video. There may be slight differences between each manufacturer. no.845 (7-prong, …
If I could make a suggestion for this recipe. Instead of piping the pastry creme in from the bottom, pipe it in from the top. If you noticed after John took a bite, the creme was oozing out from the bottom from the holes. But by piping it in from the top, once done, you will be dipping it in the chocolate topping, so it will seal the holes.
Hi mister John, I tried a lot of recipes from your Chanel and loved them all, I baked brownies, eclairs, cream puffs,cookies, toffee ” that holiday treat “,Carmel cake ..and all of them were more than fantastic ..as we say in Arabic Mashallah for things we are amazed of, so I thank you so much for your trusted recipes, I actually only search for dessert recipes on your website, so thank you from my heart💞
This is one of my favorite recipes, and I keep going back to this one although I realized that you recently published a new eclair article about 1 month ago, but I prefer this recipe. If you don’t mind, here are a few tweaks to consider: 1) I use regular salted butter in the choux pastry instead of unsalted and adding salt. Seems redundant. 2) The Choux makes 12 eclairs but the pastry is only enough for about 8 eclairs, so I would suggest to multiply the ingredients by 1.5 times. 3) I use Lindt Excellence 85% cocoa dark chocolate to make the ganache and those who love coffee can also add about 10 grams of fine (espresso) ground coffee in the ganache, in my opinion adds more flavor. 4) i like the pastry cream but the next evolution of eclairs is to make Creme Patissiere and add melted chocolate, which makes the pastry cream chocolate colored and it also adds more firmness. In this case I cut the eclairs into top and bottom halves and I pipe the chocolate colored cream to the bottom half before closing the top, and then I dip it into the melted chocolate ganache for final assembly. Just enjoy! Much ♥ from Texas!
I’ve made this recipe twice before and both times they were ADORED. This recipe is absolutely delicious and the article is very helpful. He doesn’t just tell you the steps as they are, he shows you exactly how to stir, pipe, and bake the eclairs. My friend showed me this website and I’ve fallen in love.
I tried the eclairs today but it seems an important note has been missed – after you have finished baking the eclairs, turn off the oven and let them sit and cool for about 10-15 mins, without opening the oven door. I made the mistake of taking them out right away which made the first batch totally flat. Please add this to the recipe.
this recipe is exactly the same as for a catalan “bunyol de vent”! I do them every year for Pascua (holy week in Spain, basically), but instead of making them on the oven, you deep fry them. Also, not elongated but rounded. The reaction is immediate, and it creates a big bubble of mass almost completely empty on the inside, with a delicious spongy texture inside and a soft crust. When right out of the oil, they get a sugar bath that sticks because of the heat and that’s it! Although not typical, I love to fill some of them with custard, since they are so fluffy and empty that it’s easy to inject them with whatever you want. fun fact: the “vent” in “bunyol de vent” means air in catalan because of it’s big inside cavities. They turn out as big bubbles, but so light!
So, two things I wanted to bring up to you. I am a culinary student and we made eclairs a few weeks ago. The first thing is, when you warm the butter and water and bring it to a boil, you then add your flour and you are to stir vigorously for 1 minute. The reason you do that is to cook off the flavor of the flour. The second thing is when you added the hot dough to the mixer, you turned it on and started adding the eggs. What we were taught is to put it in the mixer, turn it on and keep feeling the bottom of the bowl and bring the temp down to were you can comfortably touch the bottom, you are wanting to bring the temperature down to 140 degrees and then you add your eggs to the dough to the right constancy. Take care.
I made profiteroles yesterday (your recipe). They came out lovely but I had difficulty filling them using a similar tip to what you use in this article. Just couldn’t get the whipped cream to come out of it. I gave up in the end and used my large, plain round icing tip. Made quite a hole in the profiteroles but once covered with the chocolate ganash, you couldn’t really tell. Very tasty they are too 😋 Perhaps your filling tip is a little wider than mine?
Currently, meant to be writing an essay, so of course, I found your website and have to watch every article! You are so talented- I am blown away by your cake decorating skills. Can’t wait to try your recipes out for Easter, they are so cute. Love your content, it’s so aesthetically pleasing and brilliant content!
This is absolutely delicious, I made this 3 times now, and this tasted great from the first try itself though the taste improved well in the 3rd try. Everyone says the best eclairs ever 😁 The only change I did is adding melted chocolate to the custard cream. Thank you so much for these delicious recipes. ❤
Hi! My friends and I are trying to make eclairs and your article really helped! So far, we made the pastry cream. I looked at your blog and it says after we take the thickened cream off heat, we need to stir in butter. However, in the article, you didn’t stir in butter, but instead directly popped it into the fridge. I was just wondering why this was. Thank you! Have a lovely day! P.S. I am so sorry if you did stir in the butter and I just missed it! 🙂
A tip for the eclairs if you dont have a tip or you dont want to eat it like a sandwich is you can take a chopstick or a large toothpick (for the toothpick, use the butt end- or unsharp end, of it and wiggle it around a few times). Just poke the chopstick in and proceed to fill up your eclair. it should work the same way (at least it did for me!)
Mine turned out really really perfect. Not perfect looking but they tasted so incredible although they were done after 20 minutes. I’m glad I took them out of the oven when I did because I think they might’ve been too dry for me otherwise. Your pastry cream recipe is perfect as well and I’ve made it a few times now. thank you!
I made these and was actually shocked that they came out perfectly. I had a hard time filling about half of them and made a small mess on the bottom but that’s okay. I did not use a dark chocolate but semi sweet and that was plenty dark for us, any darker and the chocolate ganache may have overwhelmed the pastry and filling a little bit. I also wound up only making 12 total large eclairs on one baking sheet but they were perfect after only 20 minutes on 375. Crispy and browned perfectly while hollow like they should be. I don’t have a stand mixer either so I used an electric hand mixer with only 1 mixer attached when folding the eggs into the dough, along with a rubber spatula and had success. Thanks again!
Please check the egg wash amounts: you mention 1 Tablespoon of milk but the subtitle/print says: 1 tsp. For those that rely on the subtitles, this could be important. I can’t wait to try them! I made them when I was very very young (like 10 yrs old or less) with my mom and I am now 65! I haven’t made them for years. Making the egg mixture over the stove brought back all the memories! Thank you!
Hello John… it’s currently 3:45pm here in Texas. I must say, I’ve seen many & I mean a lot of articles of people “showing” or trying to “teach” us how to cook or bake… the one thing I first pay attention to, is the ingredients, most of them, or should I say, all of them, think that they’re helping us (but I seriously believe that they’re just being cheap) by “using” the affordable stuff. But not you, kudos to you. You use the best ingredients for all of your recipes. I noticed it right away when I saw you mix the chocolate with heavy whipped cream, when others so called professionals would’ve used milk, even water (Ew!) but not you. And every & each other step you did while baking, only showed how much love you put in to your creations. Thank you John, like our kids say, You Rock! I’ll be buying your book. I hope one day I’ll get to meet you, just so you can sign my book. I hadn’t cooked or baked in 3 years, you see, I got sick, w/Lupus plus some other stuff. I was a little depressed, but after perusal your vids & recipes, you gave me something to look forward to, I’ll be baking again your recipes & very soon, my husband & kids (that are no longer little kids anymore) are going to be so happy … The only thing that has me a little (very little) is that I won’t be able to taste your very own profiterole prepared with your own hands… But I’ll deal. Thank you John, you’ve been a blessing to me, God bless you. -Gabs Hdz Ps: I don’t know if you’ll read this, I hope you do, becuz you got me out of my self-pity & mild depression.
I bake and cook all the time. It is what I love to do. I usually will get my recipes by searching 5 star recipe for and then look for a lot of views, and because of that I get some good recipes. But few motivate me to go back to leave a comment. Outstanding! Awesome recipe! Great instructions, clear and thorough. Thank you so much! The best I have ever made and what’s better is that they are the best I have ever had!
THANK YOU for saving my NYE dessert. Your recipe is on point for a first timer I was able to make it with ease. The first recipe i was half way thru and had a gut feeling it was wrong. Quickly searched your YouTube article and you confirmed my fears. I remade with your recipe and everything turned out!
Hi John, I’ve been enjoying your articles in the last few months: I’ve made orange madeleines several times using your madeleine recipe, and over Thanksgiving I made the crème brulée one and it was divine. I’m originally from France and before my family moved to the US when I was a child, we owned a bakery in France. I love éclairs, my dad made amazing ones, but I’m not sure why when you can find them in America, “chocolate” éclairs are always filled with vanilla pastry cream! I always feel cheated, that’s false advertising when the outside is chocolate! I’m teasing, but I just wanted to leave a comment for you and others to point out that while people can make any flavor combination they want, a traditional chocolate éclair, in France, would also be filled with a chocolate pastry cream, the vanilla cream is for vanilla éclairs! I’m curious if you’ve ever made them this way and found them too chocolatey, but that’s the beauty of a chocolate éclair! Anyway, thanks for another great recipe and fun article!
I loved your Tiramisu recipe and made it several times for family and friends. I keep hearing it is the best tiramisu they have ever had. I was over the moon when I found you also made eclairs which are my all time favorites! I subscribed and will be following all of your recipes. Many thanks and best of luck with everything!
If you don’t have a pastry bag there’s a way to improvise. I take a plastic drinking straw and cut it at an angle about 2 inches long. Then from the inside of a plastic sandwich bag I poke the straw through the corner. Then you fill the bag with the filling of choice. Then to make sure no filling comes out or the straw slips out I put tape to secure the straw to the baggie.
I just finished making them, 07-29-23. Ran into couple problems, cream is not enough to fill all the puffs, glaze ½ cup heavy cream +4 oz of chocolate was super runny. I had to coat them, put them in the fridge, then deep them again. Does not look like it had couple millimeters of glaze. I’ve done eclaires before, they had turned out perfectly.
I made this and it’s really delicious! But my oven is too hot at 375 degrees, I think. Both times I made it, the bottoms were a little bit burned. Even when I decided to lessen the time. Edit: I didn’t have professional piping tools, and didn’t think to cut the eclairs open…. I just put a hole on one end of the long side, stabbed a few tiny holes with a toothpick, and squeezed a degenerate piping bag (ziplock bag) filled with custard into the eclair.
Please don’t fill from the bottom, should always be the top which then gets dipped in chocolate. Doing it this way will mean that the person who bites into it, will end up with the filling in their lap. My mother who’s 85 now and been a pastry chef for almost 70 years, drummed this into me from age five lol….
I made this this past weekend and they were a huge hit with my extended family. I had made the pastry and the custard the day before and found even though I had stored them in an airtight container overnight (and had let them cool completely first), they were a little soft, no longer crispy. Thank goodness for my air fryer! I popped them in, two at a time for a few minutes and that saved the day. I did have to wait for them to cool back down, but at least the crisp was back. I also found that even though I used the full amt of whipped cream, when the custard/cream was cold it was too difficult to pipe. It actually was easier on my hands once it warmed up a little . I do love Preppy Kitchen though–it inspires me to cook and bake.
Is it possible for you to include the metric measurements and temperatures for your recipes? I changed the recipe to make 6 eclairs, but then I end up with measure like 0.33 cup or 0.13 cup. It’s really hard to figure out how much that is. The recipe looks amazing, and I hope to try it during my Christmas holidays.
Just a cautionary tale, don’t use too much milk in the custard. I used the Pyrex measurement for 2 cups and the custard in pot wouldn’t clump up after 10 minutes, it became a syrup. I’ll redo it again tomorrow but be sure the mix is a pretty yellow like color Edit: your custard doesn’t have to be thick and yellow like his, trust your gut! It works but don’t let it burn
Hi ! Very nice recipy but … you can actually “improve” the “pâte à choux” by having half water / half milk instead of just water. (Pierre Hermé tip and it is worth it !). Also, as a french, those would not be labelled Chocolate eclair since they have a vanilla filling. Chocolate éclair would need chocolate in the filling. Just add some dark chocolate, exactly as you did for the ganache, in your custard and then proceed !
I saw these at supermarkets but never bothered to know what it was called. Until I found out it was called eclairs from the movie Catch Me If You Can. The reason why this time the name didn’t go ever my head is because of the transatlantic accent they say it with, I thought they were saying “Cleo” and then when I read the subtitles and found out it was called eclair. So now whenever I rewatch that movie, I get cravings for eclairs.
Mine was almost perfect. The filling was incredible delicious before I added the cream. The cream diluted the flavour of the filling and it just wasn’t as delicious as before, so next time no cream. My ganache got too watery with the milk. Next time I will just melt the chocolate. Over all it is a great recipe ❤
Returned for your demonstration of how to make eclairs. My mother would surprise us in the midst of a struggle for the American dream when all that was left were the comforts of a mother’s cooking. Thank you for your articles and great presentation of cooking from the heart. Hopefully I can recreate what you do so masterfully. Thank you. Did follow your article on Bread Pudding! Another great.
Im happy i was raised in catholic school & my parents pushed us to attend the church at least on sundays. Also 4 having some gay/lesbian relatives/ friends… Im happy & thank GOD🙏 because now i kinda can differ between priests monks & the true gays+ lesbians😸😀😀 Ur such a good monk🙏 keep up the awesome work ! GBU
Your presentation is impeccable. I got ganache and custard everywhere! For those rookies out there, make sure your oven is clean, ours was a bit not and we got some unwanted smoke. Watch the heat, you can burn em quickly, I had to turn them all to get them even. You can also undercook them. I sliced one to make sure they were good. When doing the custard keep mixing it will thicken eventually! I did sandwich method, the pipet kept moving up and I couldn’t tell how full they were. The pastry kept coming out too. Filling them bags is messy. Use semi sweet chocolate not like me I used dark unsweetened chocolate yuk! Caught in time though. Buy a mixer it will save you tons of work trust me. Get a large tray, you run out of room fast. Expect at least 2 or more hours to do. Plan ahead. Making the whip cream was so easy and tasted amazing! Thanks for the recipe!
I love eclairs. Eclairs are French but the American equivalent is basically Boston cream long johns. I should make a healthier version of eclairs/boston cream eclairs. A recipe that is low calorie and high protein which can help you lose weight and/or improve your physical health. Also my recipe should be quicker and easier to make.
Perfect recipe! I never thought of an eclair as “sexy”, but I guess you could imagine it looks a bit like a cream filled sex toy if you felt so inclined. I love your website and have been subscribed for quite some time. You make everything so easy, and you make me chuckle with some of your cute little comments. It’s just fun being here!