Paris-Brest

Cut into the wheel-like ring and a fragrant cream appears, filling the hollow choux. The Paris-Brest is a French pastry named after a long-distance cycling race. Praliné, a paste of almonds or hazelnuts worked with sugar, is added to a cream made with ingredients such as milk and butter. Both the small single-serving ring and the large ring for slicing are made so that you taste the light shell and the thick filling together.

Making the choux ring and layering a thin ring inside

In a choux recette (the formula of ingredients and the method), water or milk, butter and salt are first brought to a boil, then flour is added and worked in the pan so that the starch is heated. Eggs are then mixed in little by little to make a choux paste that spreads smoothly. The width and height of the piping change the shape of the baked ring.

In the method taught by Naomi Nakahama, three rings are piped on top of one another with staggered starting points, brushed with egg, scored with a fork, sprinkled with chopped almonds and baked. There is also a method that fits a separately baked thin ring inside, adding another layer of pastry between the shell and the cream. The large ring, once cooled, is cut horizontally, cream is piped in, and the lid is dusted with powdered sugar, so the almonds peek out between the white sugar.

Praliné and the creams it is combined with

Praliné, made by heating nuts and sugar, then crushing and grinding them, is a paste in which the sugar and the oils of the nuts have blended, unlike crushed nuts scattered as a powder. How the nuts are roasted and the sugar is heated changes the nut aroma and the strength of the caramel.

The classic mousseline combines custard with butter or with a separately made buttercream. In one method, part of the butter goes into the warm custard and the rest is added after it has cooled. One way of making the buttercream separately is to cool an anglaise of egg yolks and milk and then add softened butter and Italian meringue. Each component is made smooth before it is combined with the custard, and then the praliné is added, achieving both a lightness that is easy to pipe and a firmness that holds its shape.

There are also methods that add butter and almond praliné to an anglaise, sometimes scenting it with rum. Depending on which ingredients are added after the eggs and milk are heated, the cream melts differently in the mouth, even though the nut aroma is shared.

The 1891 cycling race and differing accounts of the pastry’s origin

Paris–Brest–Paris is a race of about 1,200 km that began in 1891. The Durand shop, which opened in 1907 in Maisons-Laffitte, a suburb of Paris along the route, says that in 1910 Louis Durand created a wheel-shaped pastry inspired by the race. It is said to have been created about 20 years after the race began, and the family has carried on the method of filling a ring of almond choux with praliné cream.

On the other hand, the Spanish edition of the Larousse culinary dictionary states that it was created in 1891 by Bojé, a pastry maker in the same town. There are different accounts of who created it and when, and there is also a story that the race organizer Pierre Giffard ordered the pastry. The accounts differ not only on the person credited as its creator but also on the year: 1910 versus 1891.

The related “Paris-Nice” and the Paris-Brest in the 1930s

A 1909 cookbook by Émile Darenne and Émile Duval includes a “Paris-Nice,” a choux ring filled with praliné-flavored crème Saint-Honoré. Ring-shaped choux filled with praliné-flavored cream were also made under another name.

The June 1932 Paris-Soir carried an advertisement selling Paris-Brest, and a 1936 guide from the Paris tourist office features an item made with chantilly, choux and almonds. In 1930s Paris, versions filled with creams other than the praliné cream handed down by the Durand family had also spread.

According to a recollection handed down at the shop, Louis’s son Paul sought protection in 1930, but the request was rejected on the grounds that the pastry was already widely made. While the family guards its undisclosed formula, pastries of ring-shaped choux filled with nut cream spread to other shops as well.

Crémeux filled from below, whipped cream piped on top

In a method presented by Valrhona, the choux is not cut horizontally; instead, the cream is filled through a hole made in the bottom. The choux is baked with a ring of raw sugar, flour and butter, rolled thin and frozen, placed on top, and a sablé made with hazelnut flour and baked in a ring shape is also prepared separately and layered with it.

In this pastry, the smooth filling and the whipped cream piped on top are made separately. The crémeux filled through the hole in the bottom is made by emulsifying milk, gelatin, praliné and cocoa butter and chilling the mixture. For the ganache montée piped on top, gelatin is added to milk thickened with potato starch, this is emulsified with praliné and cocoa butter, cold cream is added, and the mixture is chilled at about 4°C for 12 hours before whipping.

Each piped mound is hollowed out with a round tool warmed in hot water, and a small amount of praliné is filled in. You taste the nut aroma in both the light, milky cream and the rich paste at the center, while the sablé, the topping dough and the choux each create a different texture.

Variations in éclair form and with small choux

There are also versions in an éclair shape, as well as methods in which several small choux are lined up, each piped with cream and set on a separately baked base. Putting a small amount of lemon compote at the bottom adds acidity to the rich nuts. Even when the ring is changed into an elongated choux or a row of small choux, the structure of filling the hollow with a fragrant cream remains the same.

Using pistachio from the pastry to the cream

Some versions use pistachio instead of almonds or hazelnuts. A cake made in 2022 by Vincent Crochat, a pastry chef at Landemaine, used pistachio in the topping dough on the choux, the praliné, the crémeux, the mousseline, and even the sugar-coated nuts. You taste the pistachio flavor in each component, each with a different texture: the dough on the surface, the smooth filling, the piped cream and the sugar-coated nuts.

He says he combined pistachio, which he loves, with the Paris-Brest, a pastry he is fond of, and he also cites the piped shape as a distinctive feature. While the name commemorating the wheel stays the same, the pastry’s individuality also shows in the nuts and the piping the maker chooses.

Glossary