Croquembouche
This month’s challenge recipe is for a Piece Montée, which means literally “mounted piece.” You may know this dessert by another name – Croquembouche (“crunch in the mouth”). I prefer to go by the later....(Croak-em-buche), just because that is the most widely known. Most Americans will find this only during Holiday time. Perhaps at a hotel party or brunch. But others around the world will use this at a ceremonial feast such as a wedding or baptism.
The small balls are made from Pate choux, baked and then filled with a custard lightened with whip topping. Then you cook up some sugar to use to glue them together. With remanding sugar you can make spun sugar to go around your dessert. It is important to be very careful when using the hot sugar. You can get a pretty nasty burn. Poly gloves are best to wear when working with spun sugar.

The May 2010 Daring Bakers’ challenge was hosted by Cat of Little Miss Cupcake. Cat challenged everyone to make a piece montée, or croquembouche, based on recipes from Peter Kump’s Baking School in Manhattan and Nick Malgieri.
