Sometimes on Fridays, my fingers actually get too tired to type even one more word and I am forced to do prehistoric things like pick up a phone to have a conversation. Seeing as it’s been one of those weeks–and I don’t have all of your numbers–I hope you’ll accept some gratuitous photos of these blissful muffins I made earlier this week in lieu of more than a two word description.*
Do you RTFR? I used to. I would run through every word of a recipe, then reread it twice to really get in under my skin, create a shopping list and mentally time the dish so I’d know exactly when it would be ready. I’d prep ingredients and place them in little bowls along a spotless mise. We never ate dinner at 10 p.m.
Okay, fine–perhaps I am looking back at my earlier cooking endeavors through a thick pane of rose-colored glasses, because my husband over there actually remembers the umpteen thousand times that he’s had to run back to the store because I forgot we were out of flour or olive oil, and his business analyst mind, it is more time efficient for the sous-chef to step out of the kitchen. He knows my mise is a mess, but he’d never sell me out. He also is all-too-aware that “I’m going to cook tonight!” means “better buy some fruit and maybe a baguette at the store to hold me over until at least 9 p.m.”
Oh my god, people. Just OMG. Let’s just make this one succinct, for once? Surely, I am capable of concise thought, right? These muffins are the shockingly good. Make them.
That’s not enough? Fine. Two lemons worth of grated peel are muddled into a paste with sugar, and that sugar is used to bake a simple buttermilk and vanilla muffin that is topped with a whole fresh raspberry. If it sounds simple, that’s because it is, but the flavor is anything but. The lemon peel gives what should be a sweet, harmless muffin a bitter, intense edge, and the raspberry, an almost sour contrast whose impact rivals the best blueberry muffin you’ve ever had. What I once thought was my favorite approach to lemon cake is no longer. There’s a new muffin in town.
To celebrate my sister-in-law’s swearing in to the New York bar on Monday, we went to Blue Smoke for lunch. I ordered a pulled pork sandwiched stacked about as high as my chin, and in a frightening act of who-is-this-girl and what-did-you-do-with-Deb, finished all but one or two bites of it. Later, we (mercifully) spent some quality time at the gym, and at the exact moment that Alex said “Mmm… leftover applewood-smoked chicken for dinner!” I realized not only was I still full, I had the dreaded Meat Hangover.
We all detox differently. Some of us imbibe themselves with (I’m sorry, somewhat frightening) Master Cleanses for weeks on end, others eschew breads, starches or noodles for as long as they can keep away, and a good lot of us chug water and chomp crudites till the bad feelings pass. But my Meat Hangover, like all of my other afflictions, came with very specific instructions: fruit salad, yogurt and whole grains, and I was too glutted to argue.
See, now I’m a girl who keeps my promises, eh? About everything but picking up the dry-cleaning, at least. As I expected, these pumpkin muffins were a cinch, which is good, because I expect that from my muffins. They should max out at two bowls for prep, you should be able to mix them by hand and there shouldn’t be any excessively difficult steps. It’s not rocket science.
This recipe was all of that, plus, I discovered something - you know how they always say not to over-mix muffins? A large wire whisk, when mixing by hand, really allows you to incorporate all of the drying ingredients quickly without mashing them up too much. It’s made it much harder to overdo it, despite my better efforts.
And now, the part where I am a moron, because what entry would be complete without a little self-deprecation? Evidence the first: the recipe calls for a solid-pack pumpkin puree. What did I buy? Pumpkin pie filling; you know, the stuff doctored up with sugar and spices and some crap with a lot of letters. In my first attempt at the batter, I had already mixed the sugar with the eggs and oil when I realized the pumpkin already had enough sugar. So, I dumped it (please don’t ask where, because the state of our kitchen drain is unappetizing at best). But, then it turned out that maybe the pumpkin pie filling didn’t have enough sugar, but at this point (evidence the second) I had run out. Of sugar. It baffled me too. The muffins could use some more, both sugar and spice, which was by the way the other thing that I skipped, assuming the pie filling had enough. Well, meh, not enough for my tastes.
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