By April. Spring in full. The research is moving forward and the blog is growing and the index card project has forty-seven cards and I am on card nineteen. I am not rushing. I will make each one when it is right to make it, when the season or the mood or the specific ingredient is right. Card nineteen is her apple cake, which she makes in the fall but I am making now because I had apples that needed using and because the card is on my counter and I wanted to see what early spring apple cake tastes like. It tastes like the right thing made at the wrong time, which is still the right thing.
I have been thinking about what comes after the fellowship. The dissertation will take two or three more years. After that: a postdoctoral position or a faculty position or work in policy. I do not know which yet. I know that each option involves the same work at a different scale: trying to understand what helps children who start in hard places. I will find the path from the inside of it, which is how I have found every path.
Sunday at Gloria was warm and easy. James told a story about 1987 that I had not heard. Gloria and I made the full Sunday dinner together, her directing more than doing, me doing more than directing, the kitchen working the way it has worked for years. After dinner I sat at the table with a cup of coffee and looked at the cast iron skillets on the wall and the Post-its and the composition notebook and I thought: I am going to be here every Sunday for as long as I can. This kitchen will stay in my life for as long as I live. That is the commitment I am making every time I drive the forty-five minutes. It is not a burden. It is the whole point.
The apple cake on card nineteen was already gone by the time Sunday came around, but the spirit of it — sweet, simple, made-because-it-felt-right — was still in my hands when I stood in Gloria’s kitchen after dinner. Monkey Muffins are the kind of thing that belongs in that kitchen: pull-apart, sugared, faintly ridiculous in the best way, the sort of recipe that gets written on an index card because it is too good to lose and too easy to forget. I made them for the drive home, wrapped in a dish towel, eaten in the car at a red light. That is the correct way to eat them.
Monkey Muffins
Prep Time: 10 min | Cook Time: 20 min | Total Time: 30 min | Servings: 12 muffins
Ingredients
- 1 can (16 oz) refrigerated biscuit dough (8 biscuits)
- 1/4 cup granulated sugar
- 1 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
- 3 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted
- 2 tablespoons brown sugar, packed
- 1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract
- Pinch of salt
Instructions
- Preheat oven. Heat oven to 375°F. Lightly grease a standard 12-cup muffin tin with butter or nonstick spray.
- Cut biscuits. Open the biscuit dough and cut each biscuit into quarters using kitchen scissors or a sharp knife. You’ll have about 32 small pieces.
- Mix cinnamon sugar. In a medium bowl, stir together the granulated sugar and cinnamon until evenly combined.
- Coat the dough. Toss the biscuit pieces in the cinnamon sugar mixture until each piece is well coated on all sides.
- Make butter glaze. In a small bowl, stir together the melted butter, brown sugar, vanilla, and pinch of salt until the sugar begins to dissolve.
- Fill muffin cups. Divide the coated biscuit pieces evenly among the prepared muffin cups, about 3 pieces per cup. Spoon the butter glaze evenly over the tops of each filled cup.
- Bake. Bake for 18 to 22 minutes, until the tops are deep golden brown and the centers are cooked through. A toothpick inserted in the center should come out clean.
- Cool and serve. Let muffins rest in the tin for 5 minutes before turning out onto a wire rack or serving plate. Serve warm. They pull apart easily at the seam.
Nutrition (per serving)
Calories: 148 | Protein: 2g | Fat: 6g | Carbs: 22g | Fiber: 0g | Sodium: 310mg