Sunday Brioche

One of my favorite moments of the week is Sunday morning. S and I wake up usually around eight, and quickly get ourselves presentable to the outside world and head to Petsi's.

Well, actually. Every other week for the last month or so we've been running on Sunday morning before Petsi's. We've been cycling through the 5k 101 training program with six day weeks, running every other day. So last week on Sunday morning there we were, sweaty and happy at Petsi's around nine a.m., following our run of three eight minute intervals of jogging. We looked so happy, and were still talking about the high and low points of our run, that the scruffy gentleman behind the counter asked:
"So, has running stopped hurting? Because it's always just painful for me."

We gleefully got to respond, "Yes! No more pain!" Thanks to my new shoes from Marathon Sports.

But our weekend run fell on a Saturday this time around, so straight from bed to Petsi's today.

I walk by Petsi's every morning on my way to work, and it smells amazing even at seven a.m. I often stop for coffee during the week, and have to steel myself against the beautiful delights behind the glass. Sweet potato pecan breakfast bun, filled with a core of sweet potato fluff? Raspberry jam-filled corn muffin? Ginger raspberry scone? I'm a weak person. I barely stand a chance. When asked by an employee how they can help, I often say "I'll just get a coffee," so there's no chance of the kind person asking if there will be anything else.
Sunday is a special treat, though. My amazing husband gets me breakfast every weekend, and it's always the same thing - delicious Rao's coffee (the Petsi House Blend) with a bit of soy milk, and a vanilla sugar brioche.

Brioche is a sweet, eggy, buttery bread, which always (from Petsi’s) tastes like the love-child of challah and a croissant. This special specimen is doused with vanilla syrup, flecked with the tiny black dots of an authentic vanilla bean. They bake the individual brioche rolled in spirals in a muffin tin. So much of the joy is in slowly unrolling the layers of sweet, sticky bread. Today’s brioche was warm. Whether it was warm from the oven or, as I suspect, the microwave, I simply don't care. It was absolutely delicious.