Hand made berliners…
After a whole morning making berliners (from 9:00AM to 3:00PM!) I was in need of the delicious yellowish portuguese filling that I always miss…
I’ve started my research and I wasn’t able to find a single recipe of this filling, or even similar, to what I was used to see in the portuguese pastries’ windows… Well… At last I was able to find one single recipe and with a picture of a yellow filling!!!
Despite my fears I’ve tried really really hard to trust the result and I’ve started…
Even with all the changes needed to turn that thing into something realistic (I’ve tried everything from sweet soft eggs with custard to sweet soft eggs with cream or custard with 20 egg yolks…) I ended with lots and lots of egg boxes and a filling far awaaaay from the “original”…
(I’m always sadly surprised by made up recipes, untested, without making any sense and pictures that aren’t true at all, I feel angry with impossible things published without any love or care).
In the end I’ve done a standard pastry cream, without the “coulourant yellow”, powdered yellow, the powder used on almos every filling of the portuguese pastry.
As a convicted supporter of top grade ingredients (a nice chocolate, a nice wine and only butter!!!) I was tremendously disappointed when I discovered that the taste I’ve kept from my childhood comes in a bag and is mixed with water…
Now I wait for another insight on this…
Berliners
Makes 25:
Starter dough:
5 g fresh yeast
275 g All-purpose flour, sieved
180 ml mineral water (at 20ºC)
Dough:
250 g all-purpose flour, sieved
11 g fleur de sel
65 g caster sugar
5 egg yolks
60 g fresh yeast
60 ml whole milk
65 g butter, diced
2 kitchen cloths and flour
Icing sugar or caster sugar to dust
1 l grapeseed oil
To the starter dough:
Dissolve the yeast in mineral water. Combine well with flour.
Bulk ferment the dough about 1h30/ 2 hours, covered with wrap film or until bubbly.
To the dough:
Combine the starter dough with all the dough ingredients and the yeast dissolved in milk.
Mix on medium speed for 20 minutes, or until the dough pulls away from the sides of the bowl.
Add butter and keep mixing until homogeneous.
Bulk ferment the dough until nearly doubled. Fold gently.
Divide the dough to make 25 balls and place on slightly floured kitchen cloths (5 cms spaced). Cover with another kitchen cloth until nearly doubled.
Carefully transfer the dough balls , a few at a time to a deep fryer (160º C) and fry until golden brown, 5-6 minutes each side.
Lift the fritter from the oil with a spider or basket, allowing the oil to drain away over the fryer.
Drain on paper towels.
Fill with pastry cream, jam, chocolate ganache, dulce de leche… I’ve used Pastry cream.
Sprinkle with caster sugar mixed with cinnamon or icing sugar.
Pastry cream:
300 ml cream
600 ml milk
200 g sugar
80 g cornstarch
3 egg yolks
Orange and lemon zest, cinnamon stick, vanilla
In a bowl mix together the egg yolks, sugar, cornstarch and a bit of milk (enough to dissolve the mixture).
In a saucepan bring the milk with cream to boil with orange and lemon zest, cinnamon and vanilla.
Pour the milk and cream into the egg mixture stirring constantly.
Sieve.
Place the pan over the heat again and stir constantly to thick (without boiling).
Remove from heat and strain.
Place into a bowl and cover directly with plastic wrap to stop a skin from forming on the cream.
Chill.
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11 Responses to “Hand made berliners…”
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A pinch of vanilla, eggs, sugar and cocoa... Unmeasured words, seasoned silences... stir all that I am and set aside in bain marie...
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OMG, they look fantastic and ever so scrumptious! I love Berliners! With that pastry Cream, they must taste heavenly! A real treat!
Cheers,
Rosa
ahk! i know exactly what you mean! i must have spent hours looking for a recipe for the yellow cream in a berliner, must have been last march, but i couldn’t do it. i don’t know why i wanted to so bad. i dont remember where i first saw them… but i went to portugal a month later, and they were everywhere of course and it made me think that maybe they are magical pastries that can only be created my portuguese pastry workers. are you portuguese? i love portuguese language! im going to pretend to read your blog in the portuguese version from now on.
bravo!
They look super-delish as always!
It becomes so difficult for me to think of staying trim whenever I visit your blog? How do you do it?
Leonor, these look so cute! I’m sure they taste great.
Looks like I’ve been missing out on a terrific looking dessert. Those berliners look amazingly addictive, just gorgeous to say the least !!!
Fabulous as always! Why on earth have I never thought about flavouring pastry cream with peels??
Fantastic job!
I confess I’ve never heard of Berliners. So are they kind of like donut holes filled with custard cream of some sort? Whatever they are, they look fanta-bulous! I wish bakeries around here would sell them.
Beautiful picture, look’s like a perfume-ad
I can almost taste it, melting in my mouth…delish
They look amazing!
i have an uncle in law that is obsessed with berilners. he always asks me to make them so i will bookmark your recipe. your photos are always so clean and fresh! fantastic!
I love Berliners! They look fantastic Leonor!