Lemon Meringue Cream Puffs

I've had the idea for Lemon Meringue Cream Puffs hanging out in my head for a while now. It was palling around with a whole bunch of useless information and some useful things, too. :) 


I saw some lemon meringue donuts on TV and thought that a cream puff sounded good because it's not sweet like a donut. Don't get me wrong, I love sweet things but, you might want to sit down for this, sometimes things can actually be too sweet. That's the beauty of a cream puff. It's as sweet or savory as you make it. Why? There's no sugar in cream puff batter. 

While I was thinking this recipe through and deciding how it would play out I realized that I needed a small kitchen torch. Then I got all excited that once I purchased a torch I could do all sorts of fun things in the kitchen. One of the sweet things I enjoy is crème brûlée so I'll be making some in the very near future with my handy little torch.

Lemon Meringue Cream Puffs

For this recipe you will need to make a lemon Curd, cream puffs, and the meringue. It sounds like a lot, but they are fairly simple things to make.

Lemon Curd Filling

1 cup sugar

1 cup freshly squeezed lemon juice, about 6 lemons

½ cup butter, melted

2 eggs

zest of two lemons 

Combine all ingredients in a large microwave safe bowl. Microwave in 1-minute intervals, stirring to combine, for about 4-11 minutes, depending on your microwave power. Mine is 1100 watt and I cook it for 5 minutes. You will know it's done when it thickens and coats the back of the spoon. If you want to check the temp, it should be between 185-190ºF. Chill to firm curd. The curd can stay in the fridge for at least two weeks in a container with a tight fitting lid.

Left, before cooking. Right, after.

 Cream Puffs

1 cup water

1 cup flour

½ cup (1 stick) butter

4 eggs

Preheat oven to 400ºF. Heat water and butter to full rolling boil. Stir in flour. Reduce heat to low and continue to stir until well mixed and the dough balls up. remove from heat and add all the eggs at once. Rapidly stir until will blended and starts to ball again. I use a cookie scoop that is 3 tablespoon capacity to drop onto ungreased (I use parchment paper) cookie sheet. Bake for about 30 minutes until golden. Makes about 14 cream puffs.Cool on wire rack.

Left, after adding flour. Right, after adding eggs. Dough is ready for baking.

Meringue

3 egg whites

¼ tsp cream of tartar

6 tbsp sugar

1/2 tsp vanilla

With a stand/hand mixer beat egg whites and cream of tartar on high speed until foamy. Slowly add the sugar while continuing to beat on high. When mixture starts to get to soft peak or stiff peak consistency add the vanilla. I chose to do soft peak but you can do stiff peak. This is how you know the difference: when you lift the beaters soft peaks will fold over and stiff peaks will stay pointy.

 Now it's time to assemble the puffs. To make filling the cream puffs easy I use a cake decorator with a pointy tip attachment and finding a crack in the top or side of the puff, insert the cake decorator and fill with about 2 tsp. You can't see the inside so you just have to guess on this part. If it starts to run out of the puff, you have definitely filled it enough. 

After all the cream puffs are filled, spoon meringue on top. Now the fun begins. It's time to play with the torch. Just lightly toast the meringue and you are done. Store in the refrigerator. 

Enjoy!

Until next time!