Blackberry Cream Puffs

Yes, it's been a busy 2 months. The blog break was unintentional, but after you miss a week or two it's hard to get back in the swing of blogging. It's a vicious cycle of guilt and avoidance- actually, fairly similar to life. Not that we don't have a nice list of valid excuses: Rachel has been busy moving and living the care-free life of a teacher on summer holidays. I've been busy having a baby and living the care-free life of the wife of a teacher on holidays.

If any of our readers are still out there, be rest assured that the the Reems girls are still eating. And cooking. And eating. Oh, and did I mention eating?

My latest offering is a west coast special- after 5 years in Calgary, far away from wild blackberry bushes, I am still reveling in the delight of these juicy morsels. Rachel and I come from a family of serious berry pickers. My earliest blackberry picking memories are with my grandfather; he knew all the off-the-map bushes and every summer produced ice cream buckets fully of black, juicy berries. His daughters, Joan and Wiena shared the picking gene, earning money picking strawberries at the neighbouring Slater's field. If I recall Reems folklore correctly, it was Guy (our dad) whose genes I share - he also tried his hand berry picking at Slater's one day, on a long ago summer - this ended badly, with he and his friends getting packed off after more eating than picking, and the final culmination of a berry throwing war. I can only imagine Joan and Wiena trying to distance themselves from such hooligans.

Finally, our picking dynasty falls to my sister and co-blogger, Rachel. She and our baby sister Carmen are both pickers of some repute, spending adolescent summers biking down the road post-paper route to pick raspberries on hot summer mornings. If my memory serves me it was Rachel who was the top picker in the field. Myself? I'm a liability to a picking party. I like to sample as I go, which makes for a delicious outing, but alas a slowly-filling bucket.

While I am taking credit for the divine inspiration to add blackberries to the whipped cream filling in cream puffs, I must aknowledge Dorrie Greenspan for the cream puff recipe found in her book, Around the French Table. And I must give credit to Rachel for tipping me off to Dorrie's latest book. I was initially intimidated by the mention of French in the title; however the recipes I've tried are do-able and delicious.

Blackberry Cream Puffs-
Makes about 24 medium-sized cream puffs

First make the Cream Puffs:

1/2 cup whole milk (I used 2 percent with a splash of half and half)

1/2 cup water

1 stick (4 ounces) unsalted butter, cut into 8 pieces

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 cup all-purpose flour

4 large eggs, at room temperature

Bring the milk, water, butter and salt to the boil in a heavy-bottomed 2-quart saucepan. When the mixture is boiling rapidly, add the flour all at once, reduce the heat to medium and, without a second's hesitation, start stirring the mixture like mad with a wooden spoon. The dough will come together very quickly and a slight crust will form on the bottom of the pan, but you have to keep stirring - vigorously - another 2 to 3 minutes to dry the dough. At the end of this time, the dough will be very smooth.

Turn the dough into the bowl of a mixer fitted with the paddle attachment or, if you've still got some elbow grease left, you can continue by hand. One by one, add the eggs to the dough, beating until each egg is thoroughly incorporated. Don't be discouraged - as soon as you add the first egg, your lovely dough will separate. Keep working and by the time you add the third egg it will start coming together again. When all the eggs are incorporated, the dough will be thick and shiny and, when you lift some of it up it will fall back into the bowl in a ribbon. The dough will still be warm - it's supposed to be - and now is the time to use it.

Using about 1 heaping tablespoon of dough for each puff, drop the dough from the spoon onto the lined baking sheets, leaving about 2 inches of space between each mound of dough.

Slide the baking sheets into the oven, bake for 15 minutes, then rotate the sheets from top to bottom and front to back. Continue baking until the puffs are golden and firm, another 10 to 15 minutes. Transfer the cream puffs to a cooling rack.

Keeping: You can spoon out the dough and either bake it immediately or freeze it. To freeze, spoon the dough in mounds onto parchment-lined baking sheets and slide the sheets into the freezer. When the dough is completely frozen, remove the balls from the baking sheets and wrap them airtight. They can be kept in the freezer for up to 2 months and don't need to be defrosted before baking.

Finally, when cool fill cut each puff open and fill with a dollop of whipped cream. Place 4 or 5 juicy blackberries on top of the cream. These need to be eaten soon after they are assembled. Any unfilled puffs will last over night but will need to be re-crisped in the oven the day of use.