A few months ago, my brother-in-law and his fiancee asked if I could make a croquembouche for their end-of-December wedding. Yes, it was certainly out of my cake-and-buttercream wheelhouse, but this was a challenge I couldn’t resist - and it was something I could contribute to make the wedding extra-special.
Then I started to worry: how was I going to do this? I’m used to making and decorating cakes, not cream puff towers; I’ve never worked with caramelized sugar, I’ve only made a few cream puffs in my entire life, and I’ve either got to transport this thing 2 hours in the car or make it at the site (my husband’s grandmother’s house, luckily) the morning before the wedding.
I combed through my cookbook collection for cream puff recipes and croquembouche advice. I searched the web for photos and instructions. I read through every choux paste and croquembouche and caramelized sugar post on egullet.org - all the tips about how to assemble and how to be careful with the hot sugar and so on. And I made hundreds of practice cream puffs, burnt two batches of sugar (pee-yew!), and stacked a couple of small test croquembouches.
Slowly, I started to feel a lot more confident that I could do this - and not only that, but it would turn out pretty well. Nevertheless, my fingers and toes were crossed that it would not rain that day… not only because the wedding ceremony was outside, but because I didn’t want the cream puffs to come tumbling down in a pile of humidity-softened sugar, melting filling, and floppy pastry!
We headed up to the wedding site the day before to help get the place ready, so I carted half my kitchen along and made everything on-site. After several hours in the kitchen (and a last-minute run to the store for heavy cream, whoops), I had 200+ profiterole-sized puffs, a double batch of pastry cream and a triple batch of cheesecake mousse to fill them, and my caramelized sugar ready for assembly the next morning. (I caramelized the sugar and put it in a glass container to microwave later; I didn’t want a hot pot of sugar on the stove while people were running around doing wedding-y tasks.)
The next morning, bright and early, I started filling puffs. The wedding was at noon but family photos were at 10am, so I had about three hours to get the croquembouche ready — not to mention getting all pretty for the pictures. Puffs for the bottom half of the croquembouche got a filling of vanilla pastry cream; those on top half were full of cheesecake mousse.
When it came time for assembly, I relied on advice from an egullet.org member: build the croquembouche inside a cone form. I rolled a sheet of posterboard into a cone, lined it with Reynold’s Release foil (the kind that’s supposed to be non-stick - it lived up to its name, thank goodness), warmed up the sugar, and started dipping and sticking to form a hollow tower of cream puffs. I dipped only the sides to stick the puffs together; too much caramelized sugar per puff, and eating one nearly pulled your teeth out.
Despite having to re-warm the sugar a couple of times, the construction went well and faster than expected. Since I hadn’t made a test version this large, I was surprised at how heavy the cone got as it filled up… and that made me worry. Would it support its own weight?
The croquembouche sat point-down in its dunce-cap cone until about 11:30am, when I set it on its stand, removed the paper cone… it was still standing! Next, however, I had to remove the foil. Slowly, I pulled… a little further… a little more… and it was done. The croquembouce was standing on its own - and quite solidly, I must say. I slipped a few more cream puffs into gaps around the bottom to even out the base, and that was ready for showtime. Huge sigh of relief.
After the ceremony, I popped into the kitchen, heated up my sugar again, and made some spun-sugar strands to wrap around the croquembouche. I didn’t make these earlier in the day because I knew they would be the first to soften and potentially melt in a warm house full of people. I made three sets to wrap around the cone. And then… finished!
Here’s how it came out:
I’d say the final height was about 1.5 to 2 feet, involving somewhere between 160-180 puffs. By the time they served it, the sugar was just a little soft, enough so that we could break off chunks of puffs without smushing them or sending sugar shards all over the carpet.
We served them with raspberry puree and dark chocolate sauce. It was a hit, the bride and groom were happy, no one lost a filling while eating the caramel, and I was thrilled. Now I can’t wait for an excuse to make another one… I’d love to try a chocolate one…or, if I made a savory croquembouche, what to stick it together with?… hmmm… this could require some more experimentation…
