Chocolate Eclairs

For the pastry (Choux):

1. Preheat the oven to 200°C. Lightly grease a baking tray and keep aside.

2. Heat the water and butter together in a saucepan till the butter melts completely and bring to a rolling boil. Remove the saucepan from the heat.

3. Immediately add in all the flour at once. Mix to combine until the flour comes together to form a clumped ball. Set aside to cool.

4. Once cool, add eggs to the mixture and beat in until you get a smooth uniform shiny mixture of dropping consistency.

5. Transfer this mixture into a piping bag with a 1 cm nozzle attachment.

6. Pipe the eclairs onto the baking tray. Each should be about 3" long and well-spaced, with a minimum of rapart from each other.

7. Bake in a pre-heated oven for 30-35 minutes till golden brown and crisp to touch.

For the filling:

Beat the whipped topping with an egg beater until it doubles in volume. Fill into a piping bag.

For the icing:

1. Combine the butter and milk in a saucepan and heat on low-flame until butter is melted.

2. Remove from the heat and add cocoa and icing sugar.Stir in well to make a smooth creamy mixture that should be easy to spread.

For the assembly:

1. Once they have cooled down to room temperature, slit the eclairs lengthways and generously pipe whipped cream within each.

2. Spread the chocolate icing on the top, cool and serve.