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Air Fryer Eclairs

Nothing beats homemade eclairs! Fluffy crisp choux pastry filled with a luscious smooth vanilla pastry cream, finished with a rich chocolate ganache on top!
Prep Time30 minutes
Cook Time30 minutes
Resting Time1 hour
Total Time1 hour
Course: Dessert
Cuisine: European, French, Italian
Keyword: chocolate, eclairs, pastry cream
Servings: 8

Ingredients

Choux pastry

  • 125 ml water
  • 60 g flour plain
  • 1/4 tsp salt
  • 65 g butter
  • 2 eggs room temp

Vanilla pastry cream

  • 250 ml milk
  • 15 g cornstarch
  • 25 g sugar
  • 2 egg yolks
  • 1 tsp vanilla
  • 1/4 tsp salt

Chocolate Ganache

  • 55 g dark chocolate chopped
  • 30 ml heavy cream or double cream

Instructions

Preparing the Vanilla Pastry Cream

  • In a small saucepan with the heat turned off, combine together all the pastry cream ingredients. Cook your cream filling on medium heat, stirring continuously until it thickens. It is important not to move away from the cream while cooking as once it thickens you have to remove it from the stove immediately or it will burn. Place the cream into a clean bowl and cover with plastic wrap, making sure that the plastic wrap is touching the cream. Leave it to cool down in the fridge for at least an hour.

Preparing the Choux Pastry

  • In a saucepan over medium heat, bring to a boil the water, butter and salt. Remove the saucepan. Add all the flour and stir well until all the flour is incorporated.
  • Transfer the saucepan back on medium heat, and cook the dough for about 2 minutes. Stirring constantly to make sure that none of the dough sticks to the saucepan. Transfer the cooked dough to a large bowl.
  • Mix the dough slightly so that it cools down a bit. You can either do these steps in a stand mixer or by hand.
  • Start adding an egg at a time to dough. Before adding another egg make sure that the previous one is fully incorporated. In addition, do not be alarmed, but at first when you add the egg, the dough will break. Just continue mixing until a smooth dough will soon be achieved.
  • Fill a large piping bag with the dough. You can either use a large round tip or a french star tip.

Air Fryer Cooking Method

  • Prepare two parchment papers the size of your air fryer basket. On each one pipe 4 equal size eclairs of about 10cm in length. It's important to leave a good amount of space between them as they will puff. Brush the top of the eclairs with water.
  • Bake them in the air fryer at 180°C or 350°F for 15 minutes. After 10 minutes of baking, I like to turn over the eclairs so that the bottoms are cooked through as well.
  • Once they are ready, place them on a cooling rack. With a toothpick, do two little holes at the bottom of the eclair so that the steam can escape.

Oven Cooking Method

  • Before starting the choux pastry, preheat the oven to 220°C or 425°F. Line a baking tray with parchment paper. Set aside.
  • Pipe 8 equal size eclairs, about 10 cm. It's important to leave a good amount of space between them as they will puff. Brush the top of the eclairs with water.
  • Bake them for 10 minutes. Reduce the temperature to 180°C or 350°F and continue cooking for 30 minutes.
  • Once they are ready, place them on a cooling rack. With a toothpick, do two little holes at the bottom of the eclair so that the steam can escape.

Preparing the Chocolate Ganache

  • Chop finely the chocolate and place in a bowl. The finer the chocolate is, the quicker it will melt. Gently heat the heavy cream on medium heat until it starts to simmer. Pour the cream over the chocolate and let it rest for about 3 minutes. Once most of the chocolate has melted, stir until completely combined.

Assembly

  • When ready to fill the eclairs. Fill a piping bag with the pastry cream and pipe a generous amount, enough to fill each shell. Dip the eclairs in the prepared ganache.