"What do you want me to make?" I asked Flo, who'd just announced her impending visit.
"The brioche tart!" she replied. And then for good measure she added my short ribs in cab sauce. Two of the more time-intensive dishes in my repertoire, those.
And thus I started the three-day process that is the brioche tart. I mixed the creme fraiche on Saturday, carefully monitoring it on Sunday. It's got to be just the right consistency when you toss it in the fridge. Meanwhile, I made the white sauce (caramelized sugar, vanilla bean seeds, and white wine with egg yolks whipped in for 30 minutes. And of course the brioche dough itself, which requires some 30 minutes of intense kneading until it's just the right consistency, then oven and overnight rising sessions. While that was going on, I drove 30 minutes to the good grocery store to get fresh fruit to serve with the tart. On Monday before Flo and her bag of Cheetos got here, I started assembling the tart, lining its edges artfully with unrefined sugar and baking it until the custard in the middle was 175 degrees. Not 170. Not 180. A perfect 175. And then after dinner, which itself required five hours to prepare, I sliced Flo's tart. I put freshly sauteed fruit on it, then white sauce on that, then toasted almonds on that, then powered sugar on that. Flo took a bite, proclaimed it delicious, and then never took another.
"I'm just too full," she said, handing it back to me with her orange fingers.