Naughty and nice

I'm married to an evil genius. Oh, he looks like a clean-cut, mild-mannered techno-geek on the outside, but I'm telling you: evil. Pure evil.

Last year Jim's sister Holly came to a family gathering with a couple batches of cream puffs. Some of them were stuffed with custardy vanilla filling and others she had left plain to be filled with delicious seafood salad. Both options were addictively tasty, bordering on decadent. But it was Jim (evil genius, I tell you) who took the cream puffs over the edge. He got the recipe from Holly and in the following weeks he began to tinker with it. With some experimentation, he took what was once a decadent cream puff and turned it into something beyond sinful: a chocolate-dipped, chocolate custard-filled cream puff. You can gain ten pounds just from looking at them (and twenty if you actually eat one).

Sometimes being married to Jim is a little unsettling; does he actually want a fat wife? Why else would he keep making these diabolical cream puffs? It's almost like my husband is the Dr. Frankenstein of baking. But that's a small price to pay when he takes out the trash without being asked.

By request, I made a batch for a little soirée this evening. Good thing I'm off sugar, huh? Or there might not be any left for tonight!

Oh, and if you think you've got the willpower, the recipe is here.