ON THIS WEEK’S episode, senior Test Kitchen editors Shilpa Uskokovic and Jesse Szewczyk are here to introduce you to a star that deserves her moment: Jesse’s Banana Pudding Paris-Brest.
What is a Paris-Brest, you might ask? Great question! It is a classic French dessert that is as delicious as it is dramatic. Jesse and Shilpa dive into all things pâte à choux, detailing all of the intricate qualities that make it the hard-working yet rewarding pastry dough that it is. They break down every step of the process—like the banana-infused pastry cream and wonderfully crunchy DIY candied nuts—that create what Jesse has dubbed the “drag queen of French desserts.”
They tackle some listener questions like, “is pastry cream…supposed to be like that?” (The answer is yes. It’s a weird one!), and chat with meringue wizard and superstar baker Zoë François to help answer a listener question about conventional vs convection ovens.
Listen now to hear more about why this dessert should be your next bake to WOW your guests this fall!
Jesse Szewczyk: I am Jesse Szewczyk.
Shilpa Uskokovic: And I'm Shilpa Uskokovic.
JS: We are both senior test kitchen editors at Bon Appetit ...
SU: And this is BA Bake Club.
JS: Bake Club is Bon Appetit's book club, but it's for baking.
SU: We're creating the nerdiest and most wholesome corner of the baking internet.
JS: Every month, we publish a on bonappetit.com that introduces a baking concept that we think you should know.
SU: Then you'll bake. Send us any questions that you have or pictures of your finished creations ...
JS: And then we'll get together here on the podcast to talk about the recipe.
SU: The October Bake Club recipe for Jesse's accidentally vegan chocolate chip cookies made with olive oil is live now on bonappetit.com, and we'll tell you a bit about it at the end of this episode, but for today, we're going to be talking about the extremely impressive looking banana pudding Paris-Brest. Jesse, this is not a simple recipe.
JS: No, it is definitely not.
SU: Do you want to talk about what is a Paris-Brest? Because I feel like most of us don't encounter that in our daily baking lives, and why you thought you wanted to do this challenge for our Bake Club?
JS: Sure. A Paris-Brest is this very old school French bake that is a giant ring of choux paste. So choux paste, you make eclairs or cream puffs with. And traditionally it's filled with a praline mousseline or praline diplomat cream or something like that, which is just like a caramelized nut mixture that's ground down thinned with pastry cream or whipped cream or some cream of sorts. It's very dramatic, like a drag queen of French desserts, I would say. But I feel like the Bake Club has been killing it, so I'm like, well, how far can I push them? And I think everyone did great, flawless.
SU: Jesse, do you want to walk us through the basic steps of this recipe?
JS: Totally. So you're going to start by making a banana pastry cream, and you actually make this by steeping banana peels in milk, but more on that later. And once that's made, you're going to make some candied nuts. These are pecans, they're salty, they're sweet, they're crunchy. And then after that, you're going to make the heart of it, which is you're going to make choux paste, pipe it out, bake it, and then from there it's just all about assembly. So you're going to slice your big tire-shaped choux in half, and then you're going to layer it with bananas and your candied nuts, and then just this nice piped ripple of your cream, put the lid back on and then dust it all and powdered sugar and that's it.
SU: Okay. So what makes your version different from the traditional one, then?
JS: It's similar to a traditional one, but the filling is based on the flavors of Southern American banana pudding.
SU: And how did you get there?
JS: How did I get there? By sitting in a room and speaking to you and just saying anything that came to our mind for probably an hour.
SU: This is true. I remember were this brainstorming session. Hana was on it as well. Hana Asbrink is our deputy food editor. I remember-
JS: And it ended, and then Hana, she does her thing when she Slacks us at like 6:30 PM, 7:30 PM, she's like, "What if?" "How about this?" "What if?" And then next morning she's like, "I'm sorry, but what if," "How about," and it just ended up here.
SU: Yes, because Hana's brilliant. She's the one who was our unrequested pizza dough tester.
JS: Yes. Hana is the hidden backbone of this, so thank you, Hana. It originally was an eclair.
SU: Yes. I remember it being an eclair.
JS: A banana pudding eclair. I made, I don't know, a couple. It was fine. I was trying out different shapes and then I had some extra choux, so I just piped this little ring and everyone's like, "Wait a second, this should be a Paris-Brest." And we're like, sure. And then from there, it just took off and made a lot more sense to actually turn it into a Paris-Brest. It's the same amount of effort, the same components, yet it's so much more dramatic. It feels like an accomplishment. It's very flashy, and I'm like, why not?
SU: It was really nice to see that evolution of the shape. And do you want to break down the different components of your banana pudding Paris-Brest?
JS: Sure. Okay. I'll break them down and maybe the order I suggest making them.
SU: Okay.
JS: Okay. The banana cream. So ditch the praline cream. We're making a banana cream and it starts with a pastry cream, which, for those who don't know, pastry cream is like milk and butter, sugar, whatever else you want, like vanilla, salt, and you cook it with eggs, usually egg yolks, sometimes a combo, and cornstarch. And when that mixture reaches that point to activate the starch and cook the eggs, it thickens into this really nice creamy pastry cream. It's like the mother sauce, honestly, of desserts. You can do so much with it. But in this recipe, I first heat the milk with four banana peels. You bring it to a simmer and you very gently steep it for 10 minutes.
SU: Totally blew my mind.
JS: Yeah. Everyone thought I was crazy and I was like, just wait. And then you strain that and then you make your pastry cream with that and it just looks like normal pastry cream, but then when you smell it or you taste it, very strong banana flavor.
SU: Very strong. It was just such a brilliant move on your part.
JS: Thank you.
SU: Because it is hard to infuse the flavor of banana.
JS: Yeah banana's, it's like coconut, you know what I mean? You think you're going to get this flavor and then it actually takes a lot of work or even artificial flavoring to get there. So this is a way to get that without having to rely on anything weird or pureed banana into anything.
SU: I want to ask you specifically why you used the banana peels. Why couldn't you have just infused the flesh of the bananas?
JS: Sure. First of all, I realized that when you heat milk with a lot of banana flesh, banana is like a mildly acidic fruit. So if you heat too hot or it lingers too long, you risk the dairy breaking.
SU: Wow.
JS: Second of all, I guess my answer is why not? You have four banana peels you're going to throw away. Just use them.
SU: This was such a brilliant technique to I infuse the peels and it really, in many ways, got the essence of banana flavor.
JS: Thank you. Yeah. I dated this pastry chef and he did this to make gelato, and I thought that was really smart, so at least I got something out of that relationship.
SU: There we go. Okay. The next component in the order of how you would approach it is the candied nuts?
JS: Yes. And to preface, these are optional. You could go buy your own candied nuts and just chop them up at the end if you want to make this easier. But these nuts are pretty good. In fact, I don't usually toot my own horn, but I am pitching these nuts as a separate standalone recipe because I really think they're good.
SU: They're very good. They're like a better version of Nuts4Nuts' candied nuts.
JS: Damn, okay. We wanted a textural component and it was a natural fit to introduce nuts here as like a nod back to classic Paris-Brest. And the way that I like to candy nuts is that I take an egg white and I whip it in a bowl by hand with a whisk until it's like frothy and dry. And then I toss the nuts in that egg white, so they're wet and frothy. And then I add granulated sugar, brown sugar and salt, and I scatter them on a tray and I bake them. And the resulting nut, it's not that shiny, super hard, caramelly candied nut. This is more of it has a shell, an almost like light, aerated crispy shell akin to a meringue, almost, on the outside.
SU: Yeah, it shatters when you bite into them.
JS: Yes. And it doesn't stick in your teeth at all.
SU: Yes.
JS: Yes.
SU: Two things I'm curious about. Why do you whisk the egg white first instead of just tossing nuts in the egg white? And why would you need to toss the nuts in the egg white first, then add the sugar and not just everything at the same time?
JS: Okay. I'll answer your second question first because I can picture the test in my mind. I accidentally did that. I just put everything in after and it like, okay, you know when you season chicken with oil and spices, sometimes it gets clumpy instead of perfectly coats it?
SU: Yep.
JS: It was like that.
SU: Oh, okay.
JS: Yeah. So it just didn't adhere evenly. It was like you had pockets of candy and then nuts.
SU: I guess the sugar became too wet?
JS: I guess. Yes, and it couldn't stick. And then the reason I froth it, I think the first thing is if you just put it in with a fresh egg white, it would just slick around. It'd slinky through the nuts and you know what I mean?
SU: Ew. I got grossed it by this mental image. Okay. Yes.
JS: And then second, I do think that actually aerating the egg a little bit does result in a slightly more delicate texture in the end. I think you're not left with big, wet clumps and, I don't know, it's like a little more finessed at the end.
SU: Yeah. That totally makes sense to me. Makes sense.
JS: Anyways, these nuts are great. Y'all should make them.
SU: Yes. Okay. And then the last component is the pastry.
JS: The pastry, yes.
SU: So what do you want bakers to take away about making choux pastry.
JS: Sure. The cool thing about this recipe is that once you make it, you know how to make choux. You have a recipe for choux and you can do whatever you want with that. You don't have to make a Paris-Brest. You can make eclairs, just pipe it into a stick. You can make cream puffs, just pipe it into a dollop. You can add grated cheese to it, to your heart's desire. It's quite flexible, dollop it, and you get gougeres.
SU: Always such an elegant sounding snack. Gougere.
JS: Which is just fancy cheese puffs. You can mix it with mashed potatoes and make potatoes dauphinoise.
SU: Oh, god.
JS: Welcome to culinary school, which is just potato puffs. You can put it in a cake pan, bake two of these, put cream milk. You have Polish karpatka, which you know I love that.
SU: Also, you could deep-fry them and make churros or beignets.
JS: Yes.
SU: Yes. A choux pastry is actually, we don't make enough of choux pastry in real life.
JS: It's cool. It's also just so tasty.
SU: Yeah.
JS: Yeah. It's really nice to eat.
SU: Yeah. I think, I mean, you just listed all of these various ways to use them, and I like that it can function as both savory and sweets.
JS: It really can. Yeah.
SU: Not a lot of things in the pastry world can be that way, so it's great to find a fundamental technique that is so versatile.
JS: Yeah. No choux's cool.
SU: We're going to go on a quick break.
JS: When we get back, we'll answer some listener questions, all about the banana pudding Paris-Brest. Welcome back to BA Bake Club.
SU: Okay Jesse, are you ready for some listener questions?
JS: Oui.
SU: Okay. First, a bundle of questions from Katie. "When cooking the dough on the stove, I felt like my dough was done really fast. Is it possible to overcook at this point? I also pulled the ring out of the oven after 10 minutes at 375 because it was getting really brown and I was worried about burning. Also after baking, the choux deflated as it cooled. Is that normal or should I have baked longer?" Wow. Okay. Why don't we break this down and then let's do the cooking the dough portion first?
JS: Okay. So yes, this is a very unique characteristic of choux. You are cooking this paste, like this glob, on the stove and it feels wrong, but you're doing a few things here. First, you're like pre-gelatinizing the starches, which helps the dough hold onto some of that water while it bakes. So then when it hits the oven, that water violently expands, and that's part of the reason why you get so much puff. So yes, you can overcook it, although I think quite unlikely, to be honest, but you can cook too much moisture out of it, and you can also cook it so much that perhaps it would be a little dry to naturally pipe easily.
SU: Is there usually an indicator to know when it can come off the heat?
JS: I think the main one is that on the bottom of your pot, you'll start to notice a very thin layer of almost like dough, very, very thin though, start to collect. And once it's sticking to the bottom, you know that you've pretty much cooked it where it needs to go. I think, to be honest, it's not super high risk at this point. It can happen fast. I don't think that overcooking it is likely. I think if your choux is collapsing in the oven, I think it's more likely that it wasn't baked long enough because you really need to set that structure in place for it to hold onto itself.
SU: Agree.
JS: Yeah.
SU: So I suppose in a way, that might answer the second part of Katie's question, where she says she pulled the ring out of the oven after 10 minutes at 375 because it was getting really brown, and then she noticed that the choux deflated as it cooled. It seems to me there's a correlation, as you said.
JS: Yes. Okay, so I should explain what the instruction she's referring to is. So the recipe says you're going to bake the pastry for 20 minutes at 425, and then you're going to reduce the oven temperature to 375 and continue to bake until it is dark golden brown, which is like 20 to 24 minutes more. And this is a very long bake time, yes, but choux, it really needs it. And that first high temperature expands it and then that long, slower one makes sure it's cooked through. So then when you take it out, it doesn't deflate like this. There were many times in testing I took it out, it was under baked, and it does deflate. It exhales. Tastes good, but it's not what you want. And an undercooked choux shows its egginess, you know what I mean?
SU: It tastes eggy, you mean?
JS: Yeah. Not in a bad way, but I like it more on the crisp side, to be honest, in this application.
SU: I know that in some recipes, people poke a hole in the bottom of the choux to-
JS: Yes. To "let out the steam?"
SU: Yes.
JS: Whatever.
SU: Where do you ... okay, nevermind.
JS: Next. Anyways, I actually did try this because traditional wisdom told me to.
SU: Yeah.
JS: I don't know. I feel like it's more trouble than worth to tell someone, "Touch your ripping hot pastry on a hot metal pan and poke some holes in it while flipping it upside down and not breaking it.
SU: Fair.
JS: Yeah, whatever.
SU: Yeah. So I think the bottom line, the takeaway here is baking it long enough is more essential to prevent collapse than poking a hole ...
JS: Yeah, I like that.
SU: To release steam.
JS: Thank you for wrapping it up neatly.
SU: Okay, next question. KJ writes, "My question is, do you pipe the powdered choux inside, outside or overlapping the 8-inch circle on the parchments?"
JS: That is a good question-
SU: That's a great question.
JS: And something I should have written better, thank you.
SU: Do you want to give listeners a little bit of context, though, for what this 8-inch circle that KJ and you are referring to?
JS: Sure. So to get a perfect ring shape, I like to grab something that is roughly 8-inches. It could be a bowl, it could be an 8-inch cake pan, Shilpa's favorite size.
SU: My favorite size.
JS: And you just trace a circle on your parchment, and then you flip the parchment upside down so that whatever it is, I don't know-
SU: Your food is not touching-
JS: Yes.
SU: Non-food safe ink or pencil.
JS: Yes. And a little bonus, I like to take my choux and do a little dab on the four corners to actually glue my parchment down. So then yeah, you have the circle, it's like, what do I do with it? You pipe it on the circle. So that's a great question. And also I like to do four equal quadrants, that make sense?
SU: Oh, you pipe four dots?
JS: Like pipe 12:00 and then 3:00 and then 6:00 and then 9:00, if it's a clock. And then you pipe evenly in between those, and then I fill in the other ones, it helps me stay on track so I can ration the dough in my piping bag a little bit better. But I will say there are many times when I got to the end and like, oh, I have a missing spot, and you can actually just scrape it up and start over. If you beat up a choux, nothing actually happens. So it's pretty resilient. If you need to re-pipe it, I don't know, get a bench scraper or a spatula and just slap it back into the bag.
SU: So then you have this template. I really like that you said the quadrants. That's actually such a helpful tip. So to answer KJ's question, we are piping ...
JS: On it.
SU: On that circle template.
JS: Yes. Just right on it.
SU: Okay. On the topic of piping, the choux pastry, Jesse, we had a couple of listeners write in to say they made "mistakes" with piping. Both Elise and Janine piped their choux out differently than you say to in the recipe, and they were upset about it, but really, I guess, are there any rules?
JS: Okay, I pulled up Janine's picture.
SU: Okay,
JS: Now Janine, what I will actually say to you, so we're looking at this picture and Janine piped just like a straight tire. They're not like the little blobs. What I'm going to say is you did it the classic way.
SU: Yes.
JS: This is the traditional way to do it, so great.
SU: There's no really wrong way, essentially.
JS: No, yeah. And so we're looking at Elise's and she called this a fail, and she says that it's broken apart, her little puffs in the ring, which happens. So when you slice your ring in half to fill it, every time I did this, it fell apart, every time and no one knew.
SU: Yeah, none of us knew.
JS: Once it's on there, no one would have any idea. It just comes back together, it looks as it should. So Elise, I think you're being hard on yourself. I think this would've turned out beautiful. I think it looks like a nice color, and I don't know, you're pulling a Shilpa and Jesse or you're being too hard on yourself. I don't know. It looks good. Yeah. I'm not upset.
SU: Yeah. Bottom line is there isn't really a wrong way. You chose to do dollops because you wanted some height.
JS: Yeah, a little pizzazz with the ruffles.
SU: There we go. And Janine, you piped it as a continuous circle, which is, as Jesse said-
JS: Traditional.
SU: The traditional way to do it.
JS: Because I believe it was based on a tire.
SU: Oh yeah.
JS: There's a famous bicycle race called the Paris-Brest-Paris. So this was in honor of that. And then I think that it also became popular, like the lore says, with the bicyclists, because it's so caloric that it was almost like a carboload, so they would have it before the race to power them.
SU: Oh, cute. Okay. So here's a food science-y question from Tim, our beloved Tim Szewczyk, not related to-
JS: Not related.
SU: Okay. A question from Tim Szewczyk, "You say that it's important to gently simmer the milk and the peels for 10 minutes, pretty precisely. What chemistry is happening during that time, and how does under or over cooking the milk affect the finished cream?"
JS: Yes. Okay. I don't know if I would label this chemistry, more so just like, this is how my mind works, but okay, 10 minutes was my way of trying to, first of all, I think it extracts as much flavor as it can at like 10 minutes. There's not payoff beyond that. But second of all, I want everyone's milk to simmer the exact same amount of time because I want the same evaporation to occur. So I want them to go into making this pastry cream with the same volume of liquid, everybody. So then your pastry cream is the same stiffness. I don't want you to go in with a cup and a half because you over-reduced it or the full whatever that I called for. I want everything to be precise. So I apologize everyone, but yes, set a timer for 10 minutes.
SU: Okay. So the answer to why you ask for 10 minutes precisely is more to control the evaporation rate than really any chemical reaction between the banana peels and the milk?
JS: Yes. I remember, actually, my ex at the restaurant I worked at, they would do a Cambro of milk and put the banana peels in it, just chill it overnight and that's how they infused it.
SU: A cold, steep.
JS: Yes. Yeah.
SU: Interesting. Okay. This question from Katie has a visual component. "If I'm going to bake Saturday, do I throw them in the fridge or leave them out?"
JS: I'm pulling up the picture and I answered this. I said, leave them out.
SU: Oh, okay. So for those of you listening, Katie has sent him a picture of, I would say, three bananas in a bunch with the stickers on. They are ...
JS: Freckled.
SU: Yes. They're perfectly banana yellow, for lack of a better word, and they have, as Jesse said, freckles of brown spots.
JS: Meanwhile, I'm like, leave them out for a week.
SU: Yes.
JS: I mean, Shilpa and I were using bananas sometimes that were legit, I don't know ...
SU: Fermented.
JS: Jet black.
SU: They were on their way to being alcohol.
JS: Yes. Yeah. These got another couple months in them. You're good.
SU: You're not wrong. Yeah. I mean, listen, the real flavor of banana comes out when they are ripe. And certainly, having brown freckles is a good starting point, but don't be afraid to leave them out until they have little black spots.
JS: Totally.
SU: It's always good.
JS: Yeah. It's like when you pick them up and you can no longer pick them up, that's the cutoff for me.
SU: Jesse, I think we're letting people in a little too deep on-
JS: We're professionals.
SU: Okay, next from Meg, "The banana diplomat cream is insanely good."
JS: Thanks, Meg.
SU: "As in, we were all fighting over what was left in the bowl and the pastry bag, and mine wasn't even perfect. My banana cream was very thick out of the fridge, and maybe I didn't whisk the first half of the whipped cream enough because the finished product was definitely lumpy. Was that it? Or did I cook too much moisture out of the banana cream before refrigerating?"
JS: Okay. I was thinking about this comment, and my answer to it all is pastry cream's weird.
SU: Pastry cream is weird.
JS: If you've never made pastry cream, it is really weird, actually. You make it, it's beautiful, it's somewhat fluid, thick, and then you chill it and it's like blubber.
SU: Yeah, it's like wallpaper paste.
JS: Yeah. So you got-
SU: I've never wallpapered a day in my life.
JS: Me neither. I'm like, yes, totally. So I think most recipes or whatever you end up doing with the pastry cream, you really have to agitate it when you take it out of the fridge. You need to really mix it or whisk it to really break it back up and make it fluid again. So I think, Meg, you did everything right. Perhaps if you didn't want those little bits in your final diplomat cream, once you fold the whipped cream in, you could have just worked it a little longer. I suggest everyone takes it out the fridge, whisks a good bit until it feels fairly smooth again. But you will have bits. That is the nature of pastry cream. It's weird.
SU: If you want it perfectly smooth, after it's cooked ...
JS: Tamis. Tamis is like this stupid big barrel that's really fine that you can push things through in fine dining restaurants.
SU: Yes, it's a fine mesh sieve, but it's shaped like a cake pan and with a screen in the bottom, and it's called a tamis.
JS: Tamis. A good drag name. Tamis strainer.
SU: Could you like run the-
JS: Sure, you could use a fine mesh strainer.
SU: Finished pastry cream through a fine mesh sieve?
JS: Yeah. And you know what? I probably would. You know what I mean? If I was being particular, I would.
SU: Yeah. Jesse-
JS: I don't have a tamis, but I have a fine mesh strainer.
SU: Same thing. And finally from Karen, just made the candied pecans. Are they supposed to look so full of sugar? Thinking that when I chop them up, a lot of the sugar will come off?
JS: Okay. Yes. And I say yes because I remember when this got cross-tested, the cross-tester was also surprised at the texture. It is a unique candy nut. It is not like that shiny, caramelly nut. It's different.
SU: Yeah, they're quite matte in texture.
JS: Yeah. So I told Karen, you're good.
SU: Okay.
JS: I said go forth and chop.
SU: And on that note, we're going to go forth and take another break.
JS: When we get back, we will introduce you to a baker you should know.
SU: Welcome back to BA Bake Club.
JS: It is one of our favorite parts of the show. It is time for us to introduce you to baker whose work we think you should know about.
SU: And this month we are joined by baker, recipe developer, New York Times bestselling author of 10 cookbooks.
JS: Whoa.
SU: And Emmy nominated TV host, wearer of many fun necklaces, a torture of marrying, and a fellow CIA alum, Zoe Francois. Zoe, we're so excited to have you here. Thanks for being on the podcast.
Zoe Francois: Oh, it's my pleasure. Thanks for having me.
SU: And I feel like a lot of our listeners definitely know who you are, but for the select few who might not, do you want to tell them a little bit about who you are and what you do?
ZF: Yeah. I mean, I don't think I can outdo the intro you gave me. That was quite an honor. Yeah. I am a baker, a teacher, I have a TV show. I hadn't quite added it up, but I've written 10 books and I'm actually working on my 11th now.
JS: Wow. Good.
ZF: So I'm just constantly in the kitchen and talking about pastry and trying to get other people to fall in love with the craft.
SU: And I think you do such a good job. Your photos are amazing. I know that you actually shoot your own photos for your cookbook.
ZF: I do.
JS: I did not know that.
ZF: I do.
JS: A singer-songwriter situation.
ZF: Actually. I studied studio art in college, so food was the medium I didn't realize I was missing, but photography was what I was practicing. So they both came together, finally, and I found my form.
SU: And speaking of college, I know that you famously had a cookie cart.
ZF: I did.
SU: I feel like that you are way ahead of your time with that concept. Tell everybody a little bit more about this.
ZF: Yeah, it's true. There weren't a whole lot of cookie carts or any carts or food trucks, for that matter. I was at the University of Vermont in the 1980s and '90s. I was taking a business class and they had us write a fictitious business plan, and mine was a cookie company, and it was based on Mrs. Fields and Famous Amos and all of those cookies that were happening at the time. And I decided that that seemed like a whole lot more fun than sitting in a business class, so I quit school and I opened that, I call it a "company" in air quotes, because it was really, I was baking the cookies out of my boyfriend, now husband's, kitchen and wheeling this cart down to Church Street in the middle of Burlington, Vermont and selling the cookies and learning a whole lot. I knew very little about business or baking. So yeah, it was really such an incredible experience. I did end up going back to school and graduating, but that experience probably taught me more than anything else I learned in college.
JS: I love that. I know you have a cookie book. Would you say-
ZF: I do.
JS: Cookies are your favorite thing to bake? I mean, when I think of your work, I think of so many iconic things like you're a meringue wrangler, and you're right too. It's like, do you have a favorite thing to bake?
ZF: Gosh, I don't. I really don't. I mean, I love cookies, but I also love cake. And I would say my soul charging thing is to throw a flame at a meringue. That's really what just gets me going-
JS: Casual.
ZF: And I'm like, it makes me dance and it makes me smile, and anytime I whip out the blowtorch is really a happy moment for me.
SU: Do you ever just make meringue at home just to torch it?
ZF: All the time. Oh, just to torch it? Like if I'm in a-
JS: As like therapy?
SU: Yeah.
ZF: Exactly. If I'm in a bad mood, I just-
JS: Burn stuff.
ZF: Whip out the egg whites and go for it. Yeah. Basically. It's true.
JS: You know what, it's healthier than a lot of other things.
SU: There we go.
ZF: I know. It's really true. Maybe my next career is a meringue therapist.
JS: A glassblower or something.
ZF: Exactly.
JS: Okay. So this episode, we've been talking all about my recipe, which is a banana pudding Paris-Brest.
ZF: Yes.
JS: And a couple of years ago, I know you published a Paris-Brest recipe, so I'm wondering if you could give our listeners a bit of an overview of why this dessert is worth baking and going through all the trouble, and if there's any watch-outs or anything major you took away from developing yours.
ZF: Yeah. Okay. Well, first of all, I mean, I think a project like this is the most fun, and it's one of those things that the end product is so delicious, but it's really the journey of getting there that is exciting and fun for me. And I mean, I think that's true of baking in all cases, but there's so many different techniques in this one recipe, and so I really feel like, in your club, when you're going through a recipe like this, there's so many different techniques to teach and experiences to have, and so I think that part of it's really fun. And also to watch people have that aha moment when they're doing it, because it can seem super intimidating to take all of these different elements and think of it all ending up as that one beautiful Paris-Brest, but then when you break it down, they're really not that difficult to do, if you do it one step at a time.
Starting out with the choux paste, it's like understanding what that choux paste looks like when the flour and that water and butter comes together and you get this paste, and then all of a sudden you add eggs to it and it turns from this thick, gloppy mess into this beautiful, satiny, silky mixture, and then you pipe it and throw it into a hot oven, and all of a sudden you have this puff and it's like magic. That experience, for people who aren't trained as pastry chefs, is really a magical moment in a home kitchen. And so I love that you're doing it. I love doing it, and then filling it. I mean, the banana is completely nontraditional, and I love it. I love the fact that you used banana peels in it. I mean, this changed my view on banana peels.
JS: It was a big controversial in the chat, using the peels. Yes.
ZF: Yeah, I bet it was. I mean, I have done a lot of pastry cream using roasted bananas, so I would roast them in the oven so that you are condensing the sugars, and it just makes it more and more intense, that flavor. But it never occurred to me to throw the peels in there too.
JS: I like the roasting.
ZF: So I love that.
JS: Yours was raspberry, right, your Paris-Brest?
ZF: Mine was raspberry, yeah. And so I made this quick raspberry, it's not even a preserve because you're basically just crushing the fruit and then folding it into the pastry cream. But I just wanted to go with something that, like yours, wasn't traditional because I was doing it in the summertime. The traditional version with the praline is quite heavy and rich.
JS: You really need a good food processor too.
ZF: Yeah. You just really, and so I wanted something, not only flavor-wise, but also it needed to pop. I wanted the color. I wanted that pink, bright, beautiful color that was going to call these people into a big project like this, and I just thought the brightness of the berries was going to be really nice with the rich pastry cream.
JS: No, it sounds lovely. I really want to try it.
ZF: Yeah. I'm going to try yours too.
JS: We can compare notes.
ZF: Yeah, we'll compare. We'll compare.
SU: Zoe, that was really fascinating, and the way you explained choux pastry, my gosh.
JS: That was poetry, right there.
SU: Yes. It was very poetic.
JS: Meanwhile, I'm like, it feels wrong. It's gloopy.
ZF: Yeah, it is. It goes from gloopy to just smooth and luscious and lovely.
SU: It is an incredible transformation. And related to that, we had a question from a listener, and we thought you would be the perfect person to help us answer this, and it's from Allison, who writes, "My oven has a conventional mode and a convection mode. When should I use convection for baking, if ever?"
ZF: Oh, yeah. I mean, I actually think that the choux paste is a great place to flip on that convection heat because the convection, because it has that whirling wind added to the heat, it just makes everything more intense. You don't always want to use it. If you're baking a custard, I would never do it. Certain cakes, I wouldn't use it, but with the choux paste, because you want that jolt of heat to create the rise, you have the egg in there that's going to stretch that dough into a nice puff, and so the jolt of heat from the convection is going to be an addition to it. It's going to help with that.
The one thing to keep in mind when you do use convection, because it is a more intense heat, is that it will tend to brown faster. And so you really need to watch it because a lot of times people have this false finish. They think it's finished because it's browned, but it can actually be raw on the inside. And with choux paste, you need to make sure that not only has it puffed, but that it's dried out enough that it's not going to collapse once it's cooled.
SU: I wonder, I'm trying to think of other things that could also perform really well, almost better when baked in a convection setting.
ZF: I recently made a souffle. I don't always use the convection heat, but I did because I wasn't getting that dramatic, I wanted the souffle to come up and over the sides of the dish, and it just wasn't doing it with the flat heat. And so I switched on the convection and all of a sudden, I got that puff that I wanted. So I really feel like anything that you want to rise intensely like that is a great place to use it.
SU: Yeah, like a popover.
JS: Yes.
ZF: Yeah, popovers, definitely.
JS: I'm thinking a Basque cheesecake, to get a really dark top.
ZF: Yes.
SU: That's fun. Before the inside sets, yeah, that's a good one.
ZF: That's right, absolutely.
JS: Because I've done it in an air fryer and it works so well.
ZF: Oh, really?
JS: It works so well. Yes.
ZF: Cool.
JS: Zoe, where can people find you on the internet or more of your work, if they want to keep up?
ZF: Yeah. I spend a whole lot of time in my newsletter, so on Substack. ZoeBakes on Substack. I love that platform because I can really deep dive over there. Of course, I'm on Instagram also at zoebakes, and on my website. I'm pretty much everywhere.
JS: That's fair.
ZF: Yeah. But I would say right now, because you can just get so in the weeds and so detailed on Substack, that's my favorite place.
JS: Yeah. That's what we're finding too, is we can really nerd out with people.
ZF: That's right.
SU: Yes.
ZF: It's fun.
JS: Amazing.
SU: Thanks, Zoe, for being here. It's been a joy watching you through the internet and seeing everything that you do. I think you make desserts that are very classic, but also feel modern at the same time, and you make them very approachable, and that's not an easy task, as Jesse and I have discovered.
JS: They feel grand too.
ZF: Yeah. Well, this is such a joy. Thank you. And you are doing such amazing things. I just love it. I love that you're bringing Paris-Brest into everybody's kitchen, so ...
JS: Both of us.
ZF: Yeah. Bravo.
JS: You and me both.
ZF: Yep. So terrific.
JS: That's it for this month's edition of BA Bake Club.
SU: Jesse, could you tell our bakers about the October Bake Club recipe?
JS: I can. I'm finally doing it. I'm giving us a cookie.
SU: Yes. Oh my gosh.
JS: I am healed. It has been years from the book, and I'm ready. And an even more surprise, it is an accidentally vegan olive oil chocolate chip cookie.
SU: Okay. I want to provide people a little context here.
JS: Yes.
SU: When Jesse says all of these things, it's because he wrote a cookie cookbook.
JS: I did, many years ago.
SU: What year was it?
JS: I don't know. 2021? Yeah.
SU: Yeah. Right. 2021.
JS: Yeah, that sounds right. Something like that. Sure, sure. Not that long ago.
SU: A very good book.
JS: Thanks.
SU: A few members of our Bake Club have bought it and used it and have nothing but good things to say. So highly recommend. And he has finally healed from the trauma of developing 100 cookie-
JS: I used my advance money to go to therapy.
SU: And the result of this is he has made us a chocolate chip cookie recipe that happens to be accidentally vegan.
JS: Yeah, I thought olive oil chocolate chip cookie sounded so cool. And then the next thing you know, and I said, well, it's vegan now.
SU: There we go.
JS: There we go.
SU: Any other special ingredients or equipment that our bakers should have?
JS: I would say get yourself a nice bottle of olive oil, but don't get yourself a really good bottle of olive oil.
SU: This sounds very similar to the advice you gave for a chocolate olive oil cake.
JS: Same thing. Yeah.
SU: An extra virgin olive oil.
JS: Yes. Extra virgin.
SU: Nothing too fancy.
JS: Not a finishing or drizzling ...
SU: Got it.
JS: None of that spout stuff.
SU: Okay. Excellent. Great. Well Bake Clubbers, once you bake the cookies, send us your pictures and questions. There are so many different ways for you to get in touch with us.
JS: You can comment on the recipe, on the Epicurious app or on the Bon Appetit website. You can comment on our Substack chat or email us at bakeclub@bonappetit.com. And if you've made it and you loved it, rate and review the recipe on our site. We're your host, Jesse Szewczyk ...
SU: And Shilpa Uskokovic.
JS: Michele O'Brien is our Senior Producer.
SU: Michael Gino is our Studio Engineer.
JS: Research Editing by Jaia Clingham-David.
SU: This episode was mixed by Amar Lal at Macro Sound.
JS: Chris Bannon is Conde Nast, Head of Global Audio.
SU: If you like the show, leave us a rating and review and hit that follow button so you'll never miss an episode.
JS: And if you're not already part of the club, head to bonappetit.com/bakeclub to find out all the information you need to join.
SU: Thank you for listening to BA Bake Club. We'll see you next month.