First Daring Bakers Challenge-Eclairs!

I joined a baking group called The Daring Bakers and my first challenge was Eclairs! The recipe was chosen by Tony Tahhan and Meeta and comes from here. I was super excited to make these but waited until I had a good reason to make them, a coworkers birthday. We had a couple options with the recipe and I chose to make mine with a vanilla filling and a chocolate sauce on top.

I got all of the ingredients to make them and started baking. The dough was very easy to make, they puffed in the oven, which made me happy, and then I let them cool. I came back to see me beauties and they had fallen. I'm not sure what happened, but they were no longer puffed and beautiful. It was a little tricky to cut them since they were so thin, but I managed! I wanted a vanilla cream in the middle so I made one with the help of my good friend Martha Stewart, but she let me down. Her cream was not what I was looking for. So I turned to my other friend, Kraft Foods and used the recipe below for a super easy cream which I know is a winner! And then I covered them in chocolate!

I got mixed reviews but most people loved the eclairs. I however, didn't. I don't think that I'll make them again, ok I had a request for them so maybe 1 more time, but it was fun to experiment and go outside of my baking box! I can't wait for next months challenge!

Here is the recipe for the eclairs!
And here is the recipe for the vanilla filling I used:

2 cups cold milk
2 pkgs. (4-serving size) JELL-O Vanilla Flavor Instant Pudding & Pie Filling
1 cup thawed COOL WHIP Whipped Topping

Mix the pudding mix and milk until thick. Then fold in the Cool Whip topping until combined. Place the mixture in a large resealable plastic bag and place in the fridge until ready to use.