I Don't Want To Go To Work Tomorrow

Since I couldn't stop looking up my Italian ex-boyfriend on the web (and one can find out a LOT of stuff that way), I thought I'd at least add this recipe to the mix, because...I freaking feel like it.

I don't exactly have the guy's permission, though I did write it down right in front of his oft-wandering green eyes. But in the spirit of new, irreverent beginnings (2009, Obama, and my new baking/pastry quasi-career), I'm now taking the liberty of offering up the recipe, as this is the most amazing pastry cream I've e'er to eat. With or without the Italian.

(I can't remember if this is his aunt's recipe—in name and not blood, and a woman who sounds like the most amazing cook I've ever heard of—or his mother's, or someone else's.) The mindset of the recipe was a bit challenging to follow, which is how I remember Luca, so I tried to change it to suit us mere mortal types.

LUCA'S ITALIAN PASTRY CREAM

Yield: enough to have a good time with, or at least fill an enormous batch of profiterole shells

4 egg yolks
8 Tablespoons sugar
500 milliliters milk, approximately 2+ cups
4 Tablespoons flour
Little bit of vanilla extract
Several large pieces of lemon rind

In a medium-sized stove pot, mix egg yolks and sugar until super smooth.

Add milk slowly, alternating with the flour, and continue back and forth between the two. Mix thoroughly until smooth.

Place on stove over low flame/heat.

Add vanilla extract and lemon rind.

Stir continuously, in counterclockwise direction (apparently very important—I haven't dared try it the other way), on low flame/heat until consistency is right. Approximately 20 minutes.

Chill for 40 minutes.

• For Chocolate Cream: omit vanilla and lemon rind, and before cooking, add 4 Tablespoons cocoa.

• For Chantilly Cream: add a little whipped cream to pastry cream once it's cooled.