Quick choux wreaths or puffs

One choux pastry for both věnečky and větrníčky: extra butter and a 250 °C start. About 80 pieces on two trays.

Ingredients

• 250 ml water
• a pinch of salt
• 90 g butter
• 140 g coarse flour (hrubá mouka)
• 4 eggs
• fat, for greasing the trays

Method

1. Bring the water, salt and butter to a boil.
2. Reduce the heat and stir in the flour all at once; mix until the dough pulls cleanly away from the pan and is no longer sticky.
3. Take it off the heat and let it cool slightly.
4. Preheat the oven to 250 °C.
5. Beat in the eggs one at a time, mixing continuously, until the batter is smooth and slightly elastic.
6. Pipe onto greased trays: wreaths as two stacked rings for věnečky, or small round mounds for větrníčky.
7. Bake at 250 °C for 5 minutes, then reduce to 200 °C and bake until golden — roughly 5 more minutes at the higher heat and 5 at the moderate heat. Do not open the oven door while baking.
8. Slice immediately while still hot (this keeps the shells from tearing later). Cool completely before filling.

The filling is left open: sweetened whipped cream is the simplest. For věnečky use the vanilla buttercream and rum glaze from the wreath recipe; for větrníčky use the vanilla pudding cream, caramel whipped cream and caramel glaze from the caramel větrník recipe.

This dough uses a higher butter-to-flour ratio (90 g : 140 g) and a hot 250 °C start, which is why it puffs faster and more reliably.