Not thrift shop, but certainly thrift shopping: when our granddaughters were young, I fell over a garage sale in a posh neighborhood at which the mother semiannually purged the lush closets of her two daughters whose sizes matched our girls. The mother frequently dressed her children identical outfits (and I mean complete outfits!) from which we could pick fabulous stuff. French and Spanish designer dresses and accessories. The mother was incredibly nice, thrilled for these pieces she had lovingly selected to find appreciative homes. At pennies on the dollar prices.
I splurged on outrageous and luxurious stuff I would never consider at several times her price, much less the original. Our younger girl yawned at most of it but the older one was ecstatic, having a glimmer of understanding about both style and quality. Perhaps her favorite were a pair of cherry red calfskin 1.5" heel flamenco maryjanes. At age seven, she wore them to every dressy occasion possible, crooning “they make me feel so TALL”.
Reporting on the first attempt at muffintop muffins. I used a pretty basic banana muffin recipe that has always been a standby for me. Unfortunately, I was well into the prep when I discovered that our milk was well on it’s way to becoming cheese, so I had to use cream instead (half a cup). I was surprised that the wells in the pan turned out to hold as much as they do. They’re about four inches across, and I expected they’d hold the same volume as a standard muffin, but in fact they hold about twice as much.
The result? Well, instead of 12 standard muffins, I ended up with 6 large, flat muffins. They are drier than usual, but I suspect that’s due to the cream vs milk substitution and not from the larger but shallower profile. My favorite part of the muffin is still the top, but these did not seem to be ‘all top’, just ordinary muffins that were wider and flatter. I’ll probably keep the pan to use again at some point, but if I had paid full retail for it, I’d be disappointed.
