Churros

Guys.

I made churros.

They were wonderful.

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That’s it. That’s the blog post. You’re welcome.

Jump to Recipe

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Just kidding. You all know I’m way too into this blog to leave it at that.

SO.

Why did I decide to make churros? Because I’ve recently become obsessed with The Great British Baking Show and they are always making something called Choux (say “shoo”) pastry for various treats, like cream puffs…and eclairs…

And churros.

And I said to myself, “That doesn’t look too hard. I can do that!” So I looked up recipes and ratios and instructions and cobbled together all the tips and tricks that sounded helpful and got myself a Choux pastry recipe.

So of course I’m going to blog about it but…what would I make?

Not anything that required the dough to puff up and have me fill it. Absolutely not. Why? Because what if I messed it up and the puffs didn’t puff and then I made filling for no reason? It would be terrible and sad. No, no, churros were much safer. And also I love churros. And I love cinnamon (although not as much as Whitney does).

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So before we get into this particular misadventure, what is Choux Pastry?

WELL.

Pâte à Choux is a pastry dough that originated in France and uses a high moisture content to create steam during cooking for that signature puff. Apparently it was invented in 1540 so it’s like an old woman. I only say woman because it was also apparently used to make something called poppelins which were supposed to look like breasts? The 16th century was weird, man.

Anyway, Choux pastry is made up of flour, water, milk, eggs, butter, salt, and sugar. That’s it. There’s no rising agent like yeast or baking soda/powder. The puff is completely dependent on the steam that’s produced during the bake. The high moisture content of the pastry is achieved by boiling the water, milk, and butter together before mixing in the flour. Since the liquid is warm, the starch in the flour becomes gel-like and it will better absorb the water. It’s not particularly useful for churros since they’re not generally made as puffs, but it’s still interesting.

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So before we really get into the churros and the process of making Choux, I have two things. First off, I’m sorry for the lack of pictures. It’s hard to take pictures between steps and then when I was done I was really excited to eat all the churros so I slacked on the picture-taking. Next time I make something with Choux (I’m coming for you, cream puffs), I’ll get someone to take pictures of/for me while making that ish. Promise. Maybe.

The other thing is that if you want to make this, you NEED a kitchen scale. Baked goods are generally pretty finicky and all ingredients should be weighed for best results. If you don’t have one, they’re actually pretty cheap and useful to have if you want to try other baked things like breads and fancy cakes.

The links below are for a nice digital one that’s about $12 on Amazon. Or if you want to be bougie and spend all of your money on a kitchen scale, you can check out the ones from Williams Sonoma, I guess.

Ozeri ZK14-S Pronto Digital Multifunction Kitchen and Food Scale, Elegant Black, 8.25

Williams Sonoma Kitchen Scales

Anyway, on to the making of Choux!

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So first get your ingredients and blah blah blah. See? Look at all my ingredients.

Next, I weighed everything. Choux pastry is typically a 2:1:1:2 ratio of liquid, butter, flour, and eggs by weight, with a little salt and sugar thrown in for flavor.

I planned on using about 250 grams of flour (about a cup), so I measured that out into a bowl and then weighed the wet ingredients. I weighed out 250g each of water, milk, and butter (about 2 sticks even though I only have 1 in the picture) and threw it all in a medium saucepan with 2 teaspoons of sugar and a big pinch of salt. Yes, I’m mixing imperial and metric measurements. I make my own rules here.

So I brought all those wet ingredients to a boil over medium heat while giving it a little stir every now and then. Once they started boiling, I took the saucepan off the heat and dumped the flour in and stirred it with a wooden spoon. Guys, stirring that shit was HARD. You have to stir very vigorously since the flour gets very sticky and gel-like. Eventually you’ll incorporate all of the flour and the mixture will be nice and smooth. This is called a panade (say pah-nahd).

Flatten your panade to the bottom of the saucepan and return it to medium heat so that it can form a film on the bottom. You’ll know it’s ready when it starts to make crackling sounds (like rice cereal in milk). Remove the saucepan from the heat again and stir your panade vigorously (basically this recipe is also a mini workout) until all the steam evaporates. This is called evacuating the steam.

Once you’ve evacuated the steam, add an egg to your mixture and stir vigorously (I refused to use any other word to describe how you should be stirring in these ingredients. When I say vigorous, I mean vigorous) until the egg is completely absorbed. Keep adding eggs one at a time (about 3-4) until your mixture is smooth and glossy.

Toss that shit into a piping bag with a star tip and you’re good to go! Just don’t put too much in (like I did) or you won’t be able to pipe out little lines without a colossal mess all over your goddamn hands (like I did). Also, my mixture was really stiff while it was still warm, but it became easier to pipe as it cooled a little. I don’t know if it’s supposed to be that way (I couldn’t find anything about it on the interwebz), but at least it worked out! Also if anyone tries this out and has a similar experience, let me know in the comments so that I can feel validated in not being a failure. Conversely, if you don’t have this problem keep it to yourself (jk, please tell me what your experience was so that I can fix myself).

Anyway, pipe some lines of Choux onto parchment paper (about 2-4 inches for cute mini churros), be sad that your churros are so tiny because you lost your large star tip, then cut a bigger whole in your bag to try making them a little bigger without a star shape and cry when you realize that you made the hole too big. When you’re done crying, pipe out discs/balls so that you can make puffed churros. Also while you’re piping churros you should should start heating your oil for deep-frying.

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I used a wok because that’s what my mother has always used when deep-frying foods (Although she never made churros) and so that’s just made sense to me. Apparently you can also use a stock pot or whatever. Anyway, dump a bunch of oil in a pot or wok and heat it to 360-375° F. If you don’t have a thermometer (like the one in the link below), you can stick a chopstick or the handle end of a wooden spoon into the oil. If you get a steady amount of bubbles covering your utensil, your oil is ready. If you get a ton of rapidly popping bubbles your oil is too hot and your should turn the heat down a touch before adding your churros.

Polder Candy/Jelly/Deep Fry Thermometer, Stainless Steel, with Pot Clip Attachment and Quick Reference Temperature Guide

Scoop your churros up onto a spatula and add them to your oil. I did 3-4 at a time because I didn’t want to bring the temperature of the oil down too quickly. While my first batch started frying, I mixed 1/4 cup of sugar with a tablespoon of cinnamon (you can adjust based on your own tastes but Whitney and I really like a strong cinnamon flavor) so that I could be ready to roll them one they were done. I fried those churros until they were golden brown, then took them out and placed them on a paper towel to drain for a couple minutes before rolling them in cinnamon sugar.

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With my round ones, I had a couple of issues with them being raw in the center until I realized that I should let them puff up in the oil (like a cream puff). I knew the puffs were done when they cracked and I could hear the steam escaping when I took them out of the oil. They were still doughy on the inside, but at least the dough wasn’t raw!

Look at all my little churro babies.

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I love them.

I loved them so much that I ate them. Just like Kronos the Titan. Except this was because they were tasty and not because I’m afraid that my children would overthrow me in the same way that I overthrew my father.

Also they were crispy and delicious! Did I eat more than I should have? Probably. Was it worth it? Absolutely.

Go forth and make churros, y’all!

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