My patisserie challenge, Choux-vanille

French Village Diaries patissiere challenge

Welcome to my patisserie challenge. This year I have decided to buy something different from our village boulangerie every Sunday and to enjoy the simple pleasure of treating myself each week. 

Today is one of those funny days for those of us who now live in a different culture and country to where we were brought up. In the UK, mums are celebrating Mother’s Day, but here in France it is later in May. We have always celebrated the French date, as when Ed was at Maternelle (nursery school) he used to come home with lovely homemade craft items and it felt greedy to celebrate twice. Having spent yesterday afternoon up to my armpits in dust, cleaning his bedroom while he was out with friends, I can safely say we are not celebrating this weekend. However I have certainly been treated in terms of food. Last night we ate out in the village salle des fêtes as our events committee had organised a Choucroute night. It was delicious, cooked to perfection and a real meat feast with a knuckle of gammon (falling off the bone), a piece of belly pork, a smoked sausage, floury potatoes and sauerkraut cabbage per person. I really shouldn't have indulged in a patisserie today, but I pushed myself as it's not a challenge without a bit of effort!

Choucroute 

I carefully selected a Choux-vanille, something I hoped wasn't going to be too fancy or rich. It is a choux pastry shell generously stuffed full of vanilla crème patissiere and dusted with icing sugar. This ticked all my boxes in the ‘not too sweet’ category, had a nice crunch, a lovely texture and flavour and it was a good size, but unfortunately it didn’t really excite my palette like some of the other delights I have sampled.

My  patisserie challenge choux-vanille

Don't forget to join me next Sunday to see my next choice from Bernadette at the boulangerie. 

Happy Mother’s Day to all those of you who are celebrating and especially to my Mum and my Mum-inlaw.

Here are my previous patisserie challenge posts, in case you missed them:

buchette de noel,

éclair au chocolat,

forêt noire,

galette de St Jacqueline,

tartelette aux pommes,

Paris-Brest,

tartelette aux fruits
capitole framboise