Infuse the milk

1. In a medium saucepan, gently heat the milk over medium-low until just barely simmering. Stir often as it heats.
2. Cut your pine, spruce, or fir branch into a few small pieces and add them to the milk along with the orange zest. Let gently simmer for 5 minutes, stirring often to prevent milk from boiling. Remove from the heat and let cool for the flavors to steep. Ideally, you want to give it at least an hour, but even better if you can do this a day ahead and steep overnight in the fridge.

Make the choux dough

1. In a medium or large saucepan, heat the butter, sugar, salt, and water over medium heat. Stir to combine, bringing the mixture to a gentle boil.
2. Turn the heat to low and stir in the flour. Keep stirring until the dough has formed and pulls together into a ball.  
3. Remove from heat and let cool for a couple of minutes. Add the eggs to the pan one at a time, stirring each until fully incorporated. It's essential to add the eggs one at a time; otherwise, the dough will cool too quickly, and the butter will separate. You'll need to use a little effort to combine each egg, and you'll get a bit of an arm workout in the process. You may also accomplish this by transferring the dough to a stand mixer and using the dough hook. 
4. The dough will look broken or separated after each egg addition, but this is when you need to keep stirring, and it will come back together. When all of the eggs are added, you should have a solid, glossy-looking dough. See the process photo above for reference.

Pipe and bake the puffs

1. Preheat the oven to 400°F and line two baking sheets with parchment paper. Transfer the dough to either a pastry bag fitted with a large plain tip or a gallon storage bag with a corner cut off. Another option is to use a small cookie/ice cream scoop.
2. Pipe one-inch rounds of dough onto the sheets, spacing them about 2 inches apart. Press down any pointy tips with a wet finger so they don’t burn.
3. Bake at 400°F for 20-25 minutes, or until golden on top and bottom. Remove from the oven and let cool.

Make the pastry cream

1. In a saucepan, whisk together the sugar, cornstarch, and salt, then strain in the infused milk to remove the pine branches. Whisk well to combine.
2. Add the egg yolks and butter. Heat over medium-low, whisking often, until the mixture thickens to a pudding-like consistency. Transfer to the fridge to cool to room temperature.

Fill the cream puffs and serve

1. When the puffs and cream are cool, it’s time to fill.
2. Use a small knife to make a hole in the bottom of each puff, then spoon or pipe in the pastry cream. You can also slice each puff in half and spoon some cream on top. After filling, dust with powdered sugar and serve fresh.