Chocolate, Pecan & Mango Choux Buns

Before starting this Chocolate, Pecan & Mango Choux Buns recipe, organise all the necessary ingredients for the choux pastry. Pour the milk and water in a saucepan.

Add the butter, sugar and salt.

Place over medium heat and cook until the butter has completely melted.

Remove from the heat and add all the flour in one go.

Combine well with a spatula...

... until homogeneous. The resulting dough is called 'panada'. Dry off the panada over medium heat, stirring with a wooden spatula, until the paste comes away from the sides of the saucepan.

One by one, add the whole eggs...

... and combine until completely incorporated.

Add another egg and stir...

... then repeat the operation with the remaining eggs.

Scoop the choux pastry into a piping bag fitted with a plain nozzle (10mm diameter).

Pipe the choux puffs on a Silpat baking mat, , placed on a perforated Silichef® baking sheet.

Pipe the choux buns in staggered lines.

Remove the craquelin topping from the fridge or freezer. Craquelin topping is traditionally composed of 3 ingredients in equal quantities: flour, butter and brown sugar. For this recipe, we replaced brown sugar with icing sugar. Combine the ingredients, then spread the dough between two sheets of greaseproof paper to a thickness of 2mm. Refrigerate or freeze until ready to use.

Using a plain cookie cutter (diameter 3cm), cut the craquelin topping into discs...

... then arrange one disc on top of each puff.

Bake at 150°C (gas 2) for 12 to 15 minutes in a fan-assisted oven.

For the mango brunoise jelly: Peel the mangos and dice them, using the 'Alligator' chopper. Cut the mango into 3 or 4mm slices before dicing.

Cook over medium heat until it reaches 50°C.

In a separate bowl, combine the pectin NH powder and the soft brown sugar.

This is essential to avoid lumps.

Split the vanilla pod lengthwise and scrape the seeds out.

Add the vanilla seeds to the pectin and sugar preparation, then add all the ingredients to the hot mango purée.

Add the mango brunoise...

... and quickly bring the preparation to 80/90°C. This operation needs to be quick in order not to cook the mango dices.

Pour the preparation on a baking sheet.

Spread the preparation, making sure the mango dices are evenly distributed. Place in the fridge or freezer for 10 to 15 minutes to let the preparation jellify.

For the chocolate and pecan Chantilly: Organise all the necessary ingredients.

In a saucepan, heat the whipping cream and bring to a boil.

Tip the pecan praline paste over the milk chocolate pistoles.

Add the rehydrated powder gelatine.

When the whipping cream comes to a boil, remove from the heat and let the temperature go down to 80°C before pouring it over the chocolate.

Let the chocolate melt for about one minute, then start whisking...

... until you obtain a homogeneous ganache. Cover with cling film and refrigerate for at least 3 hours.

After several hours in the fridge (you can also make it the day before and refrigerate overnight), the preparation should have thickened.

Whip the cream with the flat beater...

... to obtain a chantilly consistency.

Scoop the chantilly into a piping bag fitted with a plain nozzle (5mm diameter)...

Take the mango jelly out of the freezer...

... and cut discs to a diameter of 4.5 cm.

Gently lift the discs and place one on top of each bun.

Make sure to proceed quickly, as the jelly discs won't take long to defrost.

The jelly discs will perfectly mould the shape of the buns.

Pipe a small swirl of chocolate chantilly on top of each mango disc.

Pipe a big swirl of chocolate chantilly on top of each chocolate disc...

... then arrange them gently on top of each puff.

Finish with a crunchy hazelnut chunk on top. Refrigerate to allow the gelatine in the chantilly cream to set.