Love or overt manipulation? There are oh-so-many lessons to learn in the world of parenting – that excruciating teeter-totter of love and happiness, and frustration and difficulty, (are you visualizing the teeter-totter?) we all seem to go into in a relativey blind state. Today, we had a little typical battle of the wills in our house – can’t say I don’t know where this comes from, and I’m not at all surprised at the outcome – because Ryan just loves to push my buttons – especially when he knows I’m trying to get him to try one of my recipes – but I got to bake anyway and so, I’m happy – and happy with my new recipe as well.
I should know better, right? I suppose I should know from all my years of parenting that it is never a good idea to overtly (or otherwise) try to manipulate your kids – especially when they are adults (this is all tongue-in-cheek, you know). You know, if you read my blog on a regular basis, that last week’s trip to California was at least partly an overt attempt at manipulation. LOL. (Move to California? Who wouldn’t want to? Do I need to bribe you – do I need to bribe myself?- it’s just that the thought of boxing up two houses and moving is ridiculously overwhelming to me – but I’m really close). Well, along with a lot of other things I’ve done wrong in this department of life, I decided this morning to try to manipulate Ryan out of the bed early – by his definition anyway, by baking something especially fragrant and seeing if he’d take the bait. He’s home for the last weekend visit before his college graduation – Wow – don’t know how that happened, but I digress….. I won’t mention how many hours I’ve been out of bed already…….
Unfortunately, I had none of his preferred ingredients in the house – fresh raspberries and oranges for his preferred Raspberry-Orange muffins – the regular ones from the Betty Crocker Cookbook and NOT, he tells me all the time, souped-up or changed in any way. So, I had to try another road.
I had successfully, a few weeks back, done a divergent Dirt Bomb Recipe and so I worked off this. I was also inspired today by Roseann Tully’s post on the Pineapple-Coconut Upside Down Cake on Intermezzo Magazine! She got me to thinking about what I did have in the house! Thank you, Roseann! Let’s see if it worked! You can decide on your own if this effort qualifies as LOVE or manipulation – ha! I did have fun making these – as far as I’m concerned, Ryan’s stubbornness is his loss……..
THE SUB-TROPICAL DIRT BOMB
3 cups all purpose flour
2 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp allspice
generous 1/2 tsp freshly ground nutmeg
1 tsp kosher salt
10 tblsp unsalted butter at room temp
3/4 cup light brown sugar
2 eggs at room temp
1 tsp vanilla
1/2 cup buttermilk
1/3 cup plain Greek Yogurt
1 1/2 over ripe bananas, mashed
3/4 cup crushed pineapple, well drained
1 cup toasted coconut, cooled,
1/4 cup crystalized ginger, finely chopped
Preheat oven to 350F. Place paper liners in baking pans to yield 18. Set aside.
In a large mixing bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, allspice and nutmeg. Set aside. In bowl of electric mixer fitted with paddle attachment, beat butter till smooth together with the light brown sugar. Beat until light and fluffy. Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition and scraping down bowl and paddle after each addition.
In a small bowl, mash the bananas with a fork. Add the pineapple, buttermilk, vanilla ginger and yogurt and mix till well blended. With mixer on low, add the dry ingredients in three additions alternating with two additions of the banana/buttermilk/yogurt mixture. Mix on low just until the flour is about to disappear. Remove bowl from mixer and fold cooled, toasted coconut in with a rubber spatula. Using a full size ice cream scoop, spoon batter into pans.
Bake 20 – 25 minutes or until toothpick inserted into center comes out clean.
Melt 1/2 stick unsalted butter. In a medium bowl, mix 3/4 cup granulated sugar and 2 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon. Set aside. When muffins are done, remove paper liners. Brush each muffin with butter and then roll in the cinnamon-sugar mixture. Roll twice if desired (who doesn’t desire?) Enjoy!
He just went out for a bagel – I get an F.