Yummy recipe and more...

For Valentine's Day dessert, I made Profiteroles with vanilla ice cream and chocolate sauce. They were so easy to make and somehow felt very special, so I thought I'd share the recipe with you. This one is from The Balthazar Cookbook:

Profiteroles
serves 6 (3 profiteroles each) - just halve the recipe if you don't want so many although you can freeze them

1/2 cup whole milk
1 stick plus 1 tablespoon unsalted butter
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup water
1 cup all-purpose flour, sifted
5 large eggs
1 egg yolk, lightly beaten

1/2 cup heavy cream
8 oz semisweet chocolate (good quality)

1 pint vanilla ice cream

Preheat oven to 350℉.

In a medium saucepan, combine the milk, butter and salt with 1/2 cup of water and bring to a boil. Add the sifted flour and stir with a wooden spoon until thoroughly combined into a dough. Continue stirring over medium heat for about 3 minutes.

Transfer the dough into the bowl of a standing mixer (or you can do that part of the recipe in the saucepan with the wooden spoon). Stir at low speed for a few minutes to lower the temperature of the dough. Increase the speed to medium and then add the eggs, one at a time. Mix until smooth, cool dough forms, about 4 minutes.

Fill pastry bag, fitted with a #9 tip, with the dough, or use a soup spoon to form small puffs (that's what I did), about 2 inches in diameter, on parchment-lined baking sheets. Brush the puffs with the beaten egg yolk (I totally forgot that and they still turned out great!) and transfer to the oven. Bake for 45 minutes, or until golden brown. Cool the puffs on a wire rack and then slice them, as if they were hamburger buns, with a serrated knife.

Make the chocolate sauce just before serving. Heat the heavy cream in a saucepan until it foams. Reduce the flame to low and add the chopped chocolate. Whisk until all the chocolate has melted and the sauce is smooth and shiny.

Fill the puffs with a scant scoop (I did a real scoop, none of that "scant" business!) of ice cream and drizzle with chocolate sauce!

Amazingly good!!

Plus, the puffs should freeze well, so if you have ice cream and chocolate sauce on hand, it's an easy dessert to put together at the last minute!

As promised, a couple of photos of the other gift I got from Daniel - isn't this necklace just beautiful?! My special love of butterflies aside (or is this a moth?), it is just stunning. I love, love, love it!!

As a last little thought, I've been thinking about my word for the year "focus," and how hard it it for me right now to do just that. It seems I go through periods of time when all is calm and I can focus on one thing at a time.

But those quite times always cause 1001 ideas to pop up in my mind, and as soon as I start working on them, the focus somehow is gone. Does that happen to you?

Right now, I don't know if I'd rather paint, knit, crochet, sew (oh the projects I have lined up for that!), write a few letters, talk on the phone, read a good book, go for walks in the sunshine, cook, bake, organize a few closets, give the kitchen the once over, etc. etc. etc. And then there's the tax return prep that is calling my name....

A busy time and even if "focus" is out the window for the moment, there is a feeling of vibrant creation and I am learning to enjoy it in the middle of what feels like a bit of chaos!

In all of this, I find that I always come back to my blog and connecting with you. It has become a central place for me — actually a true focal point in the midst of my life!

Thank you for that!!