Snack · 60 min · french

Profiteroles

This is the kind of French snack you’ll make on repeat — water and unsalted butter, 60 minutes, big payoff.

✓ USDA-verified nutrition data

Ingredients

• 1 cup Water
• 0.5 cup Unsalted butter
• 1 cup All-purpose flour
• 4 Eggs
• 1 pint Vanilla ice cream
• 4 oz Dark chocolate
• 0.5 cup Heavy cream

Steps

1. Bring the water, butter, and a pinch of salt to a rolling boil, then dump in all the flour at once and stir furiously until the dough forms a ball and a film coats the pan — that film means the starches have gelatinized, which is what makes the puffs hollow.
2. Cool the dough 3 minutes, then beat in the eggs one at a time, fully incorporating each before adding the next. The finished pâte à choux should be smooth and fall from the spoon in a slow V.
3. Pipe or spoon 12 mounds onto a lined sheet pan and bake at 425°F for 10 minutes, then 375°F for 20 minutes more, until deeply golden and firm. Pierce each puff with a knife tip to let the steam escape — trapped steam is the number one cause of collapsed profiteroles — and cool completely.
4. For the sauce, pour hot cream over the chopped chocolate, wait 2 minutes, and stir from the center outward until glossy. It should pour like heavy cream, not stand like ganache.
5. Split each puff, tuck in a scoop of slightly softened ice cream, stack two or three per plate, and pour over the warm chocolate sauce at the table. The contrast of cold cream, crisp shell, and hot sauce is the entire argument for this dessert.

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