Chocolate cream puff éclair (Éclair au chocolat)

1. Bring the water to the boil with the butter, add half the flour all at once and "cook" the dough into a smooth ball.

2. Cool slightly, then beat in most of the eggs one at a time until you have a glossy choux pastry.

3. Pipe long fingers onto a tray from a piping bag and bake at 190 °C for about 25-30 minutes until puffed and dried out; don't open the oven while baking.

4. Boil the milk with the scraped vanilla pod; whisk the remaining egg yolk with the sugar and remaining flour, then cook it with the hot milk into a thick pastry cream (crème pâtissière).

5. Slice or pierce the cooled fingers and fill them with the vanilla cream.

6. Melt the dark chocolate over steam and dip the tops of the éclairs into it; set in the fridge.

Tip: An éclair is the trio of choux pastry, vanilla pastry cream and chocolate glaze – the key is a well-baked, hollow finger. Don't open the oven while baking or the éclair collapses.