Double Chocolate Chunk Muffins

Portland spring. The shiso pushing up. The first cherry blossoms on Mt Tabor. Yoga Tuesday and Thursday at the studio. The classes were full. The body was the body.

Miya, 10, can shape onigiri without falling apart. She uses wet hands. She knows the order without being told. I called Ken in Sacramento. The pauses are longer now. I asked about the daikon. He told me, slowly, about the recent harvest. He grew six. They were perfect.

Rice bowl with garden greens. Pickled vegetables on the side. A simple summer meal that tastes like the season.

I made dashi at five. The day began.

The newsletter went out Sunday morning. The opening line took an hour. The piece took five. The piece was what it needed to be.

I drove to Uwajimaya Wednesday. Kombu, bonito flakes, white miso, a small bag of mochiko for tomorrow's project. The store smells like home.

Tomi watered the garden Saturday morning. The shiso was head-high. The shishito peppers were producing. The kabocha was running on the fence.

A reader sent me a handwritten card this week. Her grandmother had cooked Japanese food in 1970s Boise. She had felt alone in it. The newsletter, she wrote, made her feel less alone. I taped the card to the wall above my desk.

I made onigiri for tomorrow's lunch. Three triangles. Salted plum in the center. Wrapped in nori. The cling wrap. The drawer where I keep them. The system.

The neighbor's dog barked at nothing for twenty minutes Sunday afternoon. The neighbor apologized. I told him I had been writing through it and the white noise was helpful. He laughed.

The rain in long sheets Tuesday afternoon. I made tea. I watched it from the porch. The cottonwoods on the next block were silver in the wet.

I texted Miya a photo of the shiso. She texted back a heart and a single word: home.

Made dashi at five-thirty AM. Ten minutes in the kitchen alone with the kombu and the bonito flakes. The day's first prayer.

Sunday farmers market in the rain. The vendors knew me. The Hood River apple stand had honeycrisps. I bought four pounds.

I wrote at the kitchen table from six to eight. The newsletter was forming. The opening sentence was the hard sentence — they always are. I rewrote it five times. The fifth time was the right time.

Coffee with a friend Saturday morning. We talked about books, about kids, about the way our forties became our fifties. The talking is the thing.

Miya's old room is now my office. The desk is by the window. The shiso outside. The newsletter in progress. The afternoons are quiet.

Yoga Tuesday morning. The studio in Sellwood. Eight students. The class was the class.

I read for an hour Sunday night. A book of essays by a Korean-American writer about food and grief. I underlined a paragraph that said exactly what I had been trying to say in the newsletter for months.

The cat was the cat. Mochi at fifteen sleeps most of the day. She still eats with enthusiasm. She still sits at the kitchen window watching the back garden.

I cleaned the kitchen Sunday afternoon. Wiped the counters. Reorganized the drawer where the chopsticks live. Sharpened the knife. The reset was the reset.

Miya is in elementary school. The Saturday Japanese school continues. She still complains. She is still going.

Therapy Tuesday. We talked about the wedding. We talked about Barbara. We talked about Fumiko. The hour passed. The work continues.

A panic flicker Tuesday evening, brief, manageable. I breathed. I drank water. I went outside and walked around the block. The flicker passed. The body did its work.

The mochiko I picked up at Uwajimaya was for a different project, but when Saturday morning came and Tomi was in the garden and the shiso was head-high and the house was quiet, what I actually wanted was something warm and unapologetically simple — something Miya would recognize as a treat the moment she walked through the door. These double chocolate chunk muffins are that thing: a one-bowl project that asks nothing of you except that you show up to the kitchen and begin. I made them the same morning I sharpened the knife and wiped the counters. The reset was the reset, and so was this.

Prep Time: 15 min | Cook Time: 20 min | Total Time: 35 min | Servings: 12 muffins

Ingredients

1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon fine salt
3/4 cup granulated sugar
2 large eggs, room temperature
3/4 cup whole milk
1/2 cup neutral oil (such as vegetable or avocado)
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chunks, divided

Instructions

Preheat and prep. Heat your oven to 375°F. Line a standard 12-cup muffin tin with paper liners or grease each cup lightly with butter.
Combine dry ingredients. In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, cocoa powder, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and sugar until evenly blended and no lumps of cocoa remain.
Mix wet ingredients. In a separate bowl or large measuring cup, whisk together the eggs, milk, oil, and vanilla extract until smooth and cohesive.
Fold together. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and fold gently with a rubber spatula just until no dry flour is visible — a few small lumps are fine. Do not overmix, or the muffins will be dense.
Add chocolate. Reserve 2 tablespoons of chocolate chunks for topping, then fold the remainder into the batter in two or three strokes.
Portion and top. Divide the batter evenly among the prepared cups, filling each about 3/4 full. Scatter the reserved chocolate chunks over the tops of each muffin.
Bake. Bake for 18–22 minutes, until the tops are set and a toothpick inserted into the center of a muffin comes out with moist crumbs but no wet batter. Do not overbake.
Cool. Let the muffins rest in the tin for 5 minutes, then transfer to a wire rack. They are excellent warm or at room temperature.

Nutrition (per serving)

Double Chocolate Chunk Muffins — The Kitchen Project That Began Before Dawn