Valerie Bertinelli's Vanilla Coffee Cream Puffs Are a Surprisingly Easy Dessert Idea

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When you get a craving for something sweet, what are the foods you dream about? Perhaps the icy chill of a Dole Whip from Disney, or a favorite treat from the Costco bakery? Or do you long for that fanciest sweet of all, ethereal in its fluffiness, elegant with its tall crown of pastry, indulgently filled with cream? We’re talking about cream puffs, of course, a dessert that somehow became associated in our minds with magically upscale bakeries that cater to princesses, rather than being something we could make at home. But Valerie Bertinelli has a recipe for homemade cream puffs with a vanilla and coffee filling, and not only do they look delicious, but the recipe is also simple enough for anyone to make at home.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=w9i0kVZVduE%3Ffeature%3Doembed

Valerie Bertinelli usually specializes in family-friendly, home-cooked fare that’s fast and easy, so it’s no surprise that she’s been able to simplify cream puffs so the average baker can make them at home. And once you learn how, we have a feeling you’ll be getting requests to make this recipe over and over again.

Courtesy of TI Inc Books.

The first step is making the dough. It’s started off in a saucepan, then beaten in a stand mixer, though you could also vigorously stir it with a wooden spoon if you don’t feel like dirtying your mixer bowl. The dough is piped onto parchment-lined baking sheets, then baked.

In the oven, the dough puffs up. The exterior becomes crisp, and when the puffs are taken from the oven, each one gets poked with a skewer, so the steam inside can escape and so the puffs can maintain their shape.

Courtesy of Rodale Books.

The filling is really easy. Bertinelli makes one batch of vanilla whipped cream and one batch of whipped cream flavored with espresso powder, and fills half of the puffs with each flavor. We also think they could be delicious swirled together, to make a vanilla latte cream puff.

That’s the other thing we love about Bertinelli’s easy cream puffs recipe — it’s so versatile. You can really flavor the whipped cream filling with anything you like, adding in spices, jam, syrup, honey, cocoa, dulce de leche — basically any flavors you can dream of.