Italian Zeppole di San Giuseppe

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 30 minutes.

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.

Before starting the choux pastry, preheat the oven to 220°C or 425°F. Line a baking tray with parchment paper. Set aside. Pipe 12 equal size rosettes, two rounds on each other. with a hole in the middle. It's important to leave a good amount of space between them as they will puff. 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.

Cut several parchment papers into squares about 8x8cm and set aside. Fill a large pot with vegetable oil. Heat the oil to about 170°C. Place the dough in a piping bag, fitted with an open star nozzle. Pipe out the rosettes on the previously cut parchment papers. Drop each rosette with the parchment paper facing up in the oil. Once it's starting to cook remove the parchment paper and let it continue to cook for about 3 minutes on each side, until they are nicely golden in colour. Drain from excess oil on some paper towels.

With a serrated knife slice through the baked choux pastry. Place the pastry cream in a piping bag and fill generously the bottom choux pastry. Close the pastry with top part and pipe a swirl in the hollowed centre. On top of the pastry cream swirl, add the amarena cherry and give a generous dusting of icing sugar. Enjoy!

*Air Fryer 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.