There’s a reason why these classic Chocolate Profiteroles are so popular! A rich, creamy custard filling inside light, airy, crispy, perfectly baked choux pastry shells, and then drizzled with a luscious chocolate sauce on top.
Profiteroles are one of the more well known French pastries, and an easy and adaptable recipe for potlucks and parties. Serve with a mug of thick, creamy French hot chocolate for a decadent pairing.
One of my most popular recipes on the blog is this choux pastry tutorial with all the troubleshooting tips for making absolutely PERFECT choux pastry every single time.
I’ve been making choux pastry for a long time, and it’s one of my favorite easy bakes. I’ve shared a bunch of choux pastry based recipes on the blog over the years, like these classic chocolate eclairs, paris brest, perfect cream puffs, strawberry cream puffs, chicken bouchees (chicken puffs), chouquettes (French sugar puffs), chocolate choux pastry, earl grey eclairs, choux au craquelin, chocolate eclairs with coffee pastry cream, pumpkin cheesecake profiteroles etc.!
So as you can tell, I LOVE anything choux pastry.
Here, I’m sharing these Perfect Chocolate Profiteroles (Cream Puffs), a favorite holiday dessert for many! Perfectly baked choux pastry cases filled with creamy creme patissiere and topped with a luscious chocolate sauce. It’s simple, classic and addictively delicious.
Chocolate profiteroles (or cream puffs) were a BIG part of my childhood, even though the cream puffs that I grew up with were different from the classic. They had a filling that was sweeter than classic creme patissiere, but that’s a recipe for another day. 🙂
Today, it’s the classic chocolate profiterole’s turn to shine!
I won’t be going into specifics about homemade choux pastry, because you can find all the details for perfect choux pastry in this post right here. If you’d like to know how make PERFECT choux pastry without fail every time, you should definitely read that troubleshooting post.
There I talk about everything from ingredients and quantities to what to look for at each step of the recipe, and other tips and tricks to make sure you’re on the right path to making crispy on the outside, custard-y on the inside, choux pastry with a big, airy pocket for a creamy, delicious filling.
For this chocolate profiteroles (cream puffs) recipe, I piped choux pastry that was about 2 inches in diameter. It gave me choux pastry shells that were about 2.5 inches in diameter. I get 25 shells total, with this recipe.
The creme patissiere (pastry cream) recipe that I used for these chocolate profiteroles is my popular vanilla pastry cream recipe. However, 1 batch of that pastry cream recipe is only enough for about 18 of these choux pastry cases. You can also use chocolate pastry cream if you prefer.
So I made 1 1/2 batches of that pastry cream recipe to fill these bad boys. You can check out that post to find out how to make rich, creamy (and gluten-free and dairy-free!) creme patissiere for all kinds of desserts.
The chocolate sauce drizzled over these chocolate profiteroles is also the perfect pairing because it’s not too sweet, and I add a touch of bourbon to it for an extra kick.
It doesn’t make the sauce boozy, but adds another warming layer of flavor. You can leave out the bourbon if you like, and just add extra cream or water to the sauce in its place. I love pouring warm chocolate sauce over the profiteroles just before digging into them, so I always serve the profiteroles and sauce separately.
And I also love pouring plenty of it! Honestly, I have a hard time trusting anyone who doesn’t want delicious chocolate sauce over their profiteroles! 🙂
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Chocolate Profiteroles with Pastry Cream (Cream Puffs)
Ingredients:
Choux Pastry
Pastry Cream
- 1 ½ batches of pastry cream for 30 servings ingredients as follows
- 3 cups milk
- 9 tbsp sugar
- Pinch of salt
- 4 tbsp cornstarch
- 1.5 tbsp vanilla bean paste / extract / 1 vanilla bean pod
- 5 large egg yolks
- 1 large egg
- 4.5 tbsp unsalted butter softened
Chocolate Sauce
- 6 oz semi sweet chocolate
- ⅓ cup cream
- 4 tbsp unsalted butter softened
- Generous pinch of salt
- 1 tbsp agave / corn syrup optional
- 2 tbsp bourbon optional
Instructions:
Choux Pastry
- Preheat oven to 420°F.
- Prepare choux pastry dough according to the recipe here. When the choux pastry dough is ready, place it in a pastry bag that has a large round tip (or simply cut the tip off of the pastry bag).
- Prepare a baking tray with parchment paper and mist the surface with water (either using a mister or lightly sprinkle water with your hands – this is an optional step).
- Pipe 1 – 1 ½ inch round choux pastry mounds on to the baking sheet, with at least 1 inch space between each. (When piping choux pastry, keep the tip slightly embedded just under the surface of the piped choux pastry. This is to ensure the piped shape is as smooth as possible). Then gently flatten the pointy tip with a damp finger.
- Transfer the piped choux pastry to the oven, and immediately lower the heat to 375°F. Bake in preheated oven for 30 – 40 minutes in the center of the oven, or until the choux pastry shells puff up and are golden brown on top. Do not open the oven door at least until you have reached the 25 minute mark.
- Remove from the oven, and prick each shell with a toothpick and let them cool down completely.
Pastry Cream
- Follow the instructions in this recipe to make pastry cream (with scaled up ingredient quantities).
- When the prepared choux pastry has been chilled, place the pastry cream in a piping bag with a bismarck filling tip, or round tip (about ½ cm). Keep it chilled until needed.
Chocolate Sauce
- Place all the ingredients, except for the butter and bourbon, in a saucepan or microwave-safe bowl.
- Heat over medium low heat (or over a double boiler). Stir and melt the chocolate to get a smooth, shiny sauce. This can be done in the microwave as well.
- While the sauce is warm, add the softened butter and bourbon and whisk to mix completely.
- Use immediately. If it cools down too much, you can warm it up again in the microwave in 15 second intervals.
Assembly
- Cut an ‘x’ on the bottom of the choux pastry (see photos in the post). Pipe in the pastry cream (with a bismarck tip), until the pastry cases are almost full.
- Place the profiteroles on a plate and keep in the fridge (covered) until ready to serve. The cases are best filled as close to serving time as possible, to prevent them from getting too soggy.
- Dip them in the chocolate sauce or pour the warm chocolate sauce over the profiteroles just before serving.
Video:
Tips & Tricks
Other choux pasty related recipes
Classic choux pastry, Perfect cream puffs recipe, Chocolate choux pastry, Chouquettes (French sugar puffs), Choux au craquelin, Classic chocolate eclairs, Earl grey eclairs, Chicken bouchees (chicken puffs)Nutrition Information:
“This website provides approximate nutrition information for convenience and as a courtesy only. Nutrition data is gathered primarily from the USDA Food Composition Database, whenever available, or otherwise other online calculators.”
Ashley M says
My teenaged son and I have now made these a few times, and every time the choux has come out perfect, and the pastry cream (chocolate and vanilla) comes out smooth and delicious.
I really appreciate your detailed instructions and how you provide the reasoning behind why things work. I was nervous to try choux pastry, and now I feel like an expert!
Dini says
Fantastic, I’m so glad to hear that, thanks for letting me know Ashley! 🙂
Kathleen Rowe says
Inconsistent quantities. Is it 1″ or 2″ dough? Does 2″ make 24 puffs?
Dini says
Hi Kathleen
In the recipe instructions, I have noted that 1 – 1.5 inch pastry puff be piped. This will yield between 20 – 26 puffs. This also depends on the height of the pastries as well.
Hope that helps.
Sandymei says
I just did a batch and turned out very well. Tasty too!!
Jayne Cimone says
One word,…PERFECTION! and the video made it so much easier. Thank you for a great recipe