Daring Bakers’ Challenge August 2012 – Filled Pate a Choux Flamingos

Kat of The Bobwhites was our August 2012 Daring Baker hostess who inspired us to have fun in creating pate a choux shapes, filled with crème patisserie or Chantilly cream. We were encouraged to create swans or any shape we wanted and to go crazy with filling flavors allowing our creativity to go wild!

So, I opened this month’s Daring Bakers’ Challenge and saw photos of elegant pate a choux swans filled with Chantilly cream and dusted with powdered sugar.  They were just lovely.

As I admired the tasteful (and tasty) desserts, the little voice in my head shouted, “You have to make cream puff flamingos!”

Yup, that’s just the way my mind works sometimes, from graceful pastry swans to plastic lawn ornaments in a matter of seconds.  Scary. 

Of course, I am a Baltimorean, and the city is no stranger to kitsch.  Now that football season has begun, black and purple plastic flamingos are littering decorating lawns everywhere to show support for the Ravens.  Maybe the flamingos snuck into my head that way.

 

 I followed the vanilla pasty cream recipe Kat provided.

 

 I puréed the heck outta ¼ c thawed frozen strawberries and stirred it into the cream.

 

To get a “flamingo” pink, I added a touch of gel food coloring.

 

The dough came together quickly.

 

Then I stirred in a touch of pink. . .

 . . . and piped the loooong necks and bodies.  With a little bit of food coloring on a damp brush, I painted the beaks.

I had so much fun assembling the birds I forgot to take pictures, but you can see step by step directions on the Daring Kitchen post.