December 2008

This month I was fortunate to spend a few days in New

York and had lunch with good friends at A Q KAFE near

Columbus Circle. It essentially serves good food quickly

and offers a variety of interesting breakfast pastries. We

had a good laugh about a pastry called "A Slap in the

Face" and were interested in the "Berliner", but the most

delicious was the "Maria Bun." Here for you is my

rendition of a raspberry filled cream puff to make for

Christmas morning. I recommend making the pastry and

filling the night before and putting them together on

Christmas morning. They are messy to eat but really

yummy!

TANTE MARIE'S MARIA BUNS

Ingredients

1/2 cup (1 stick) butter1 cup water1/4 tsp. salt1 cup flour4 whole eggs

2 cups milk6 egg yokes1 cup sugar2 Tbs. cornstarch2 Tbs. flour1 tsp. vanilla extract1 Tbs. butter

1 cup raspberry jam

InstructionsPreheat the oven to 400 degrees. Lightly butter a cookie orhalf sheet pan.

To make the dough, cut the butter into pieces and place in aheavy bottom pan with the water and salt. Carefully, bringthe water to a boil while the butter melts. Raise the heat to arapid boil; turn off the heat; and toss in the flour all at once.Beat with a wooden spoon until the mass of dough comestogether and dries slightly from the heat of the pan. Letcool. Put the dough in the bowl of an electric mixer, andwith the paddle, beat in one egg at a time. Beat until thedough becomes very sticky. With a tablespoon, make twelvelarge spoonfuls of dough on the baking sheet. (at this pointyou can sprinkle the puffs with a mixture of butter andbrown sugar—I did not do this for the photo.) Place the panin the preheated oven and turn the temperature up to 425degrees. They are done when the puffs are very brown, afterabout 30 minutes. At this point remove the pan from theoven; make a hole in each puff with a small knife; andreturn the pan to the turned-off oven to dry the puffs, forabout 10 minutes.

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To make the filling, heat the milk in a heavy saucepan largeenough to hold the pastry cream. In a bowl, beat the eggyolks with the sugar until mixed. Mix in the cornstarch andflour; then, pour in some of the hot milk. Return all themixture to the pan with the milk and stir with a whisk overmedium-high heat. All at once, this mixture will start tothicken; this is when you should beat like crazy to preventlumping. Let boil about 3 minutes to cook the flour, beingcareful not to scorch the bottom of the pan. Spread thepastry cream on a ceramic plate to cool and cover with waxpaper. Before using the pastry cream, be sure to whisk it tomake it smooth again. (If you would like a lighter pastrycream, in a separate bowl whip 1/2 cup heavy cream untilsoft peaks, and fold it into the pastry cream.)

To assemble, cut each cream puff half with a serrated knife,into each put a large spoonful of the pastry cream, and thena spoonful of raspberry preserves, replace the top. Andserve with plenty of napkins.

Serves 12.

©Mary Risley

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