courtesan au chocolat with matcha, ube, and raspberry glazes

eggboy and i spend a lot of nights watching movies. between our big smushy couch/90s tv setup at home, and a town movie theater that makes you feel like you're in someone's log cabin, complete with clean bathrooms that smell of cinnamon, watching or seeing a movie always feels like a good option. 

the only problem is, we don't get all those cute independent limited release movies that at one point in my life only required traveling two stops on the d train. and when we do get something that doesn't star a super hero or hungry games, it plays for like one week. at least that was the case with the grand budapest hotel. 

so despite my girl crush on saoirse úna ronan and ooglie eyes over wes anderson colors, i have not seen the grand budapest hotel. yet i am still drawn to this courtesan au chocolat that apparently plays a huge role. it's a tower of chocolate-filled choux pastry puffs with pretty colored glazes and white filigree (!!!!!). so renee and lyndsay and i are all posting about these little guys today because how fun is that?!?!?1!!

until recently i had never done made choux pastry before. it was sort of grouped in my mind in the same category as the soufflé: fussy sensitive things that i should block out an entire day for. to my surprise, my first batch of puffs came out swimmingly, and so did the second batch, etc., etc. they were that easy. one day i am going to fill some with pimiento cheese but today they're filled with dark chocolate and topped with matcha, ube, and raspberry glazes.

courtesan au chocolate with matcha, ube, and raspberry glazes

first: study this cute video, it will explain a lot!

the choux: this recipe is the one i like. it's very similar to the one in the video. be sure to pipe out three different sizes, as shown in the video.

the chocolate filling: the recipe from the video, except i like using dark chocolate.

the glazes: gradually mix milk into powdered sugar until you get your desired consistency. (mine were super thick. like, thicker than honey!) divide into three bowls and add a few teaspoons of matcha green tea powder, a few drops of ube extract, and a few spoonfuls raspberry jam, until you get your desired color and flavor. i like to pass the raspberry jam through a sieve to get rid of the seeds so that the glaze is very smooth. 

assembly: fill the large and medium sized choux puffs with chocolate, dip them in the glazes, let the glazes dry, and then pipe on your filigree. you can use melted white chocolate or an extra thick powdered sugar/milk glaze, piped out of a small piping bag or ziploc bag. stack them all up and eat immediately! and also make renee's and lyndsay's :)

-yeh!

marzipan dark chocolate scones with raspberry jam

contrary to what everybody from my life as a new yorker probably thinks, there's a lot of human interaction on the farm. human and kitty interaction. i don't think i left the farm once this weekend, except to pick up the newspaper, yet i still had at least eight units of human interaction. farmer wade came to talk to farmer gene, farmer brad came to deliver three dozen (!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!) eggies from his chickies, farmer eggdad went about his daily business, and farm girl emily came over with the loveliest ladies for the booziest delightfullest brunch. it's an exciting time because planting just started, so suddenly everyone is outside, milling about, fixing things, putting things in things, gossiping (?)...

and eating scones!!

this weekend all of the hello-nice-to-meet-yous and thank-yous-for-your-eggs came with a scone or four. it was so much fun! everyone smiled a lot and went gaga over them, but i really can't take all the credit because they are based on sarah's recipe. she always posts the prettiest scones and finally they tempted me to make scones for the first time since i stopped doing the overnight shift at the town bakery. 

when i worked the night shift at the bakery, i made a sploogillion scones every night at around 2 am. i became the queen of butter cubing and got to the point where i could get three batches into the oven in approximately negative seconds. the first time i made sarah's recipe, i noticed the dough was much more wet than the bakery's, so i was a little bit nervous, but when they came out of the oven i just about died: they were heavenly. so light, so cake-y, so perfect for noshing on while sipping a mimosa. 

marzipan dark chocolate scones with raspberry jam

makes 8 scones

based on sarah's recipe

ingredients

8 oz marzipan

1 tb powdered sugar

1/2 c dark chocolate chips

2 c all-purpose flour, plus more for dusting

3 tb sugar

1 tb baking powder

1/2 tsp kosher salt

12 tb unsalted butter, chilled and chopped into  1/2-inch pieces

1/2 c + 2 tb buttermilk or heavy cream

2 large eggs

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

1/2 tsp almond extract

1/2 c raspberry jam

clues

preheat oven to 400. line a baking sheet with parchment and set aside. 

chop the marzipan into small pieces, about the same size as your chocolate chips, and then toss the pieces with the powdered sugar so that they don't stick together. place in a large bowl with the chocolate chips and set aside.

in a food processor, pulse to combine the flour, 2 tablespoons of sugar, the baking powder, and the salt. add the butter cubes and pulse until the butter is pea-sized.

add this mixture to the bowl with the marzipan. in a small bowl, whisk together 1/2 cup of the buttermilk or heavy cream, the eggs, and the extracts. add this to the dry ingredients and stir until just combined with a wooden spoon. turn the dough onto a floured surface and pat out two round discs (try not to work the dough too much). cut each disc into 4 equal triangles and transfer the triangles to the baking sheet. brush with the remaining 2 tablespoons of buttermilk or heavy cream and sprinkle with the remaining tablespoon of sugar.

poke a divot into the center of each and spoon in 2-3 teaspoons of jam.

bake for 20-25 minutes until golden brown.

enjoy them all to yourself or give some away immediately because these are best enjoyed the day of!

-yeh!

friday links + a giveaway winner

i made my first foray into the worlds of baked donuts, donut muffins, and gluten free donuts all at the same time yesterday, thanks to ashley and her kickass donut (!!!) book. pictured are some mini donut muffins of the matcha and raspberry glazed variety. next i am going to try her everything bagel donuts. (i know!)  

we had this gnocchi for dinner the other night and it was the tops.

i want to eat all of the british sweets and giggle all day at that eton mess comic.

i've been assembling recipes to make once the little patch of rhubarb in my backyard is fully grown, and i can't hardly wait! i am going to make coffee cake and tarts and datschi and so much more, it's going to be a rhubarb party and only rue and people named barb are invited.

eggboy and i read this article about saturated fat and then went out for bunless burgers about it.

me in bread form is a finalist for food52's best scallion recipe!

an interview in which sarah copeland recommends befriending a farmer. hehe.

bang on a can on arthur: everything. 

while gathering my summer reading list, i was sad to read a not-so-good review of ruth reichl's novel but so very excited to read this one of molly wizenberg's new book!

omg hello kitty airline meals

what is that emoji called with the little red hearts as eyes? that is me when i look at this.

have a good weekend, everyone!!!

oh! and a giveaway winner!! the winner of last week's meat n nuts giveaway is... miss charity! yay, charity! please send me an email with your mailing address :) yeh.molly@gmail.com

-yeh!

our town bakery

down a straight and dusty road, not more than 20 farmsteads south of ours, is a grain elevator and its town, hillsboro, north dakota. it occupies one square mile that's home to a large city hall with a stately bust of abraham lincoln out front, a very cute vintage shop where blue stickers denote the registered items for whatever town wedding is approaching, and a magical little bakery.

this bakery, our town bakery, is the definition of a gem.

one apple muffin and one bite out of the golden section of eggboy's cinnamon roll is worth every second of the 40 minutes it takes to drive there. and all i want in this moment is one of their sprinkley donuts.

sometimes when we're there we pretend that we're in the bushwick-circa-2009 of the world. if that even makes sense. it's just so much goodness in the middle of so much nowhere. and no you can't ride your bike from manhattan.

so if you're wondering a) what you should do if you ever find yourself in hillsboro without me or, b) what eggboy and i did this weekend when we should have been unpacking/painting/putting up wallpaper/ordering our floors, the answer is our town.

how were all of your weekends?? did you eat anything yummy?

-yeh!