Italian Orange-Chocolate Cheesecake Tarts and The Godfather

In the world of cooking, there are some recipes that possess that rare quality of instant legacy. These are the recipes that, from the first taste, quickly establish themselves in your mind as something really, truly special. You know that these are the recipes that will grow well-worn and yellowed in makeshift cookbooks, that will be requested by eager-eyed relatives at parties, and that will be passed down to future generations. I know a few recipes like that: my future father-in-law's chocolate panna cotta. My grandmother's Christmas struffoli. My mother's potato croquettes. And now I have another recipe to add to that list. From the moment I tried these Italian chocolate-orange ricotta cheesecakes from Giada De Laurentiis, I knew--and as did everyone else at the Midsummer party where I served them--that they would be instantly memorialized.

The same thing happens with movies. There are certain films that, at some point while you are watching them, click in your mind as a masterpiece. For me, one of those films was the tragic, frightening, and mournfully beautiful The Godfather, made by Francis Ford Coppola. This movie, in my opinion, is the closest thing American cinema has achieved to the great works of Shakespeare, with its subtle drama and crackling outbursts of violence and family strife, offset by moments of elegiacal solitude. As an Italian-American myself, I would like to say that this film does not take a jaundiced eye at Italian culture the way that other gangster movies and dim-witted reality shows do. Instead, The Godfather provides an honest look at a criminal subculture that did exist, while reminding viewers that it was, in fact, a subculture and not indicative of Italian-Americans as a whole. First of all, with all of its brilliant symbolism of shuttered windows and doors, The Godfather demonstrates that its Corleone family is closed off from the outside world. Finally, because the characterizations are so sublime and realized, the film never feels exploitative. Let's take a look at Dan's thoughts.

The Godfather


What more can be said about The Godfather, Coppola’s masterpiece which is arguably not only the greatest American film, but a testament to American art in an even broader spectrum? What about by confirming that it is, indeed, a most exciting crime saga, charting the rise and fall of a criminal empire through the businesses of the Corleone family?

But its epic greatness runs deeper. The Godfather is, in many ways, the ultimate immigrant saga that ends, as did countless immigrant sagas of both real and fictional origins, in tragedy. Sure we see the glamour and the fruits of criminal life at the Corleone home, an estate of lush patios, jovial feasts, and good cooking. But by the time the first movie is over, Don Corleone (Marlon Brando in the pinnacle role of an already legendary career) has lost his loyal but hotwired boy Sonny (James Caan), been shot and almost killed while carrying oranges from the grocer, and seen his favorite son Michael (Al Pacino) begin to follow his path into a life that can only lead to more death. Suspense is killer in The Godfather, but at its core is a story of sadness.

Ah, but Francis Ford Coppola’s brilliance is in the details. There is a reason that, as much as certain organizations have denounced aspects of the film, the movie has a place of honor in every Italian-American household. It knows Sicilian culture to the smallest of nuances; its mannerisms, dress codes, and ways of celebration. It’s a movie about Italians that truly understands Italians. This makes Brando’s and Caan’s embodiments of Old Country hooligans all the more astounding.

True to the promise of the best epics, The Godfather is a beautiful film. Tinted in sepia that takes us back to the summer of 1945, The Godfather is the ultimate triumph of production values. From the musical score to the sets, Coppola takes us into another world and traps us into its dark offices and corners of violence.

Required reading lists have long been a staple of scholarly curriculum. Movies, a much newer art, are slowly rising to the level of books and the road ahead is long. Indeed, such a smaller percentage of movies can be called art in good faith. But some of us refuse to give up hope that film, at least at its best, will someday be esteemed with the great arts and be considered worthy of a standardized required viewing list. When, and that day may never come, The Godfather is an undisputed mandated viewing title for cinema literacy.

Thanks, Dan! And I too hope for the day when the general public will view film as being just as worthy of serious discussion as books. For some reason there seems to be this hierarchy of texts. I think film texts and book texts BOTH offer mesmerizing stories and discussion points.

Now, on to great recipes that deserve recognition. As I said before, I served these tarts at a St. John's Day/Midsummer party my family had because their round shape and sunny color reminded me of the Summer Solstice. They were so delicious, with their creamy and tart texture, and everyone fell in love with them. They came from Giada De Laurentiis, one of my all-time favorite chefs. I am addicted to her shows Everyday Italian and Giada at Home. Try these as soon as possible. You'll be doing yourself a favor.

    

Italian Orange-Chocolate Cheesecake Tarts

Adapted from Giada De Laurentiis's Everyday Italian

Ingredients:

• 2/3 cup chocolate wafers, finely crushed (I used Nabisco's Famous Chocolate Wafers)
• 4 Tbsp butter, melted
• 1/2 cup part-skim ricotta cheese
• 4 oz. fat-free or low-fat cream cheese
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1 orange, zested
• 2 eggs
• Extra butter for greasing

1) Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. Lightly grease the cups of a mini-muffin with the extra butter.

2) Combine the crushed chocolate wafers and the melted butter. Place a tightly packed teaspoon of the mixture into each cup in the mini-muffin tin and press down firmly.

3) In a blender or food processor, combine the ricotta cheese, cream cheese, sugar, orange zest, and eggs. Blend until smooth. Fill prepared mini-muffins cups with 1 1/2 tablespoons of the cheesecake mixture. Place the muffin tin in a baking dish and pour enough hot water in the baking dish to come halfway up the sides of the muffin tin. Bake for 25 minutes. 

4) Transfer the muffin tin to a wire rack and let cool for 30 minutes. Refrigerate for 15 minutes. Use a small knife to gently pop the cheesecake tarts out of the cups. Serve and enjoy! (Makes about 14 tarts)

Next Time: Something superhero related! 

The Quiet Man and Irish Soda Bread

We really do have to give old weather sayings and folklore their due. Nearly everyone has heard the expression that March comes in like a lion and goes out a lamb. Actually, what most people don't realize is that the expression is conditional: if March comes in like a lion, it will go out like a lamb. If, however, it comes in like a lamb, it will go out like a lion. That has certainly been true this year in Boston.

Yummy Irish Soda Bread batter

March blew in gently, all soft breezes and dandelion-scented air. Towards the middle of the month, the temperatures hit seventy and eighty degrees. I walked around in my capris and sandals. I opened windows and admired the dappled sunlight streaking across my hardwood floors. It was too good to last, though. Boston has been stuck in a cold spell the past week, and some snow is even predicted for tomorrow, the last day of March. It seems as if March is exiting more like a polar bear than a lion.

Yummy Irish Soda Bread, front view

However, the nice thing about the month of March is that I know it is spring, no matter how cold it is. The crocuses and dandelions are blooming in my yard. Beautiful robins hop around the grass, celebrating the new life around them. Everything is green, green, green...including one of my favorite holidays, St. Patrick's Day. I celebrated St. Patrick's Day this year just the way I like it, surrounded by good food and family. I honestly don't understand people who want to get completely drunk on St. Patrick's Day. I think that's demeaning to Irish culture and a waste of an opportunity to observe such a lively spring holiday. This St. Patrick's Day, surrounded by my family and my fiance, I danced to The Pogues, laughed at my dad's funny green hat, devoured my mom's potato croquettes, and made my signature Grasshopper Pie. Moreover, I tried a great new recipe for a simply delicious Irish Soda Bread.

Yummy Irish Soda Bread slice

The movie I picked for today was The Quiet Man, but Dan hasn't had a chance to write the thought piece for that. And I haven't had a chance to watch it. I know, I know, shocker, but I've never seen The Quiet Man. I know it's directed by John Ford and it stars the iconic John Wayne. I've seen many of their collaborations in my Western film classes and elsewhere. I'm very curious to watch this film because I heard that it offers a lot of talking points. It is immensely popular around here during St. Patrick's Day, and some hold it up as a celebration of Irish-America and a love letter to the Old Country. However, others say that it enforces outdated stereotypes of a poor and rural country inhabited solely by "quirky" characters. As I said, I haven't seen the film, but I am excited to view it and better understand both sides of the argument.

Yummy Irish Soda Bread coming at you!!!

There's no argument, though, about this delicious soda bread. I adapted it from a Taste of Home magazine...I love that magazine to pieces; it never steers me wrong. What attracted me to this particular recipe was the fact that it contained sour cream, which I knew would give the bread a soft, creamy texture. My mother and I both hate foods that have really dry textures, so I decided that this was the bread for me. I also liked the addition of the caraway seeds. I wasn't too familiar with them, but they added the perfect hint of spice and tang to the bread. They reminded me of the fennel seeds my Nonna uses in her taralli, which are these savory, hard Italian pretzel-like treats. (I would like to take this opportunity to remind everyone that two days after St. Patrick's Day is St. Joseph's Day, a celebration of Italian-American culture. The pastries of the day are zeppole, or Italian donuts filled with cream. Yum!)

Yummy Irish Soda Bread
Adapted from Kerry Barnett-Amundsen's Taste of Home recipe
Ingredients:

• 3 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 2 Tbsp caraway seeds
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 1 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 2 eggs
• 2 cups (16 oz) fat-free sour cream
• 3/4 cup raisins

1) Combine flour, caraway seeds, baking powder, salt, and baking soda in a large bowl. In a small bowl, whisk the eggs and the sour cream. Stir the egg mixture into the flour mixture until it is just moistened. Fold in raisins.

2) Spoon batter into a greased 9-in springform pan. Bake at 350 degrees Fahrenheit for 40-45 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool on a wire rack for ten minutes. Remove the sides of the pan to release bread. Cut into wedges, serve warm.

Next time: No clue. Any suggestions? I welcome all ideas. I only ask two things: (1) I cook on a budget, so no outlandish or expensive ingredients that would be hard for the average cook to obtain (2) I like to cook fresh and in season...if you suggest a pumpkin dessert, I will wait until October or November to make it because pumpkin is not in season now. By all means suggest any dessert you like, but know that you might have to wait awhile to see it! 

Happy birthday, Nonna! Felice compleanno!

Red Velvet Cupcakes and Casablanca

It's one of the most exciting days of the year...Oscar day!

I love watching the Oscars. Even when the shows have been complete disasters, there is something mysterious and alluring about this night. I enjoy being cocooned in a world that, just for a while, stops what it is doing and focuses on the quasi-mythical force of film. I know that in real life Hollywood is probably not a very fun or shall we say authentic place, but on the night of the Oscars, we can pretend that the Old Hollywood of our imaginations really existed. Doesn't the very name "Oscar" conjure images of flat cap-clad directors shouting into a bullhorn, starlets posing under a spotlight, and sound stages cluttered with a heap of exotic sets? I can't help it. I'm a cinephile of the highest order.

To celebrate this day, Reel Bakers will focus on my favorite Oscar-winner (and movie, natch) of all time: Casablanca. From the sheer star power of Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman, to the classic romance and adventure elements of the plot, to the copious mythology surrounding the movie (Casablanca was built on the back lot of a studio!), I can think of no other film that better epitomizes Old Hollywood and the pinnacle of movie-making than Casablanca. To honor this movie are Red Velvet Cupcakes, quintessential romantic treats. I originally made these cupcakes for Valentine's Day, but they work well as "red carpet" desserts as well. So here are Dan's thoughts on Casablanca:

Casablanca


Why Casablanca? What has made this the most beloved, (mis)quoted, admired, and memorable film of all time? Casablanca is too grand a film for a simple answer, but of those attempted, Umberto Eco has come closest. Quite simply, it’s the ultimate movie about movies in an unusual sort of way. 


Every emotion that draws us to the movies is packed in this seemingly routine tale of romance and intrigue against the backdrop of German occupation in North Africa in the early years of WWII. There is mystery, adventure, thrills, romance, and tears.

But even more importantly, Casablanca is made like a prototype of a product of the Dream Factory. It is an icon of classic Hollywood precisely because it looks and feels so much like one. The cast includes Warner’s titans of the day. Humphrey Bogart leads the cast as the cynical Rick Blaine, an American ex-pat hiding out in Morocco while Vichy officers patrol the markets. Running the most popular café not only in Casablanca but also in all the movies and maybe even the public consciousness, Rick is hinted to be hiding from a past ruffling of wrong political feathers, but he is later revealed to be hiding at least in equal measure from heartbreak. And what a powerful scene it is when the woman who broke his heart walks into his gin joint out of “all the gin joints in all the world”. I cannot think of a better example for the case that some movies improve with repeat viewing. 

In part the power of this moment is due to the striking features of Ingrid Bergman, who was just beginning to sweep American cinema off its feet. Bergman, who none other than Roger Ebert labeled his favorite actress, had real-life qualifications for the role of Ilsa, the freedom fighter. She was an outspoken anti-Nazi pundit and demonstrated great skill in previous works for Alfred Hitchcock. But what’s truly important is what we can see on film and she makes Ilsa the strongest heroine Bogart ever came across. She has her political convictions and has made great sacrifices for them along with her contrabandist husband Victor Lazlo. But she is also human and has never stopped loving Rick. That she even has to think about following her heart or sense of duty says something about the weight of the film.

Many of the supporting actors would frequently appear in future Bogart projects, including Peter Lorre, who had had a successful film career in Germany, Sidney Greenstreet, and Edward Arnold. Claude Rains, of course, was a well-established actor by the time he appeared in Casablanca would continue to be long after. Still, he was immortalized as the morally and ideologically ambiguous (all the more fascinating a character because of this) Captain Louis Renault. Despite all the subplots going on, Casablanca pulls off the miraculous feat of allowing everyone in this amazing ensemble shine.

Casablanca is, in many ways, the movie of movies and the embodiment of the magic of movies. We love it for many reasons, not the least of which is for the way it knows how to be a movie.

Thanks, Dan! Now on to the recipe.

This recipe was as fun to bake as it was to eat. Quite simply, they are the best red velvet cupcakes I've ever had. A pretty red color, a soft consistency, an incredibly creamy cheesecake frosting...yum! This recipe came from McCormick's spice/extract company. I will keep trusting them because this was so good.

Red Velvet Cupcakes

Adapted from McCormick 

Ingredients:

• 2 1/2 cups flour
• 1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 2 sticks butter, softened
• 2 cups sugar
• 4 eggs
• 1 cup fat-free sour cream
• 1/2 cup skim milk
• 1 bottle (1 oz) red food color
• 2 tsp vanilla extract

Frosting:

• 1 package (8 oz) cream cheese, softened
• 1/2 stick butter, softened
• 2 Tbsp sour cream
• 2 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 box (16 oz) confectioners' sugar

1.  Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. 
2. Mix cocoa powder, baking soda, and salt in a medium bowl. Set aside.
3. Beat butter and sugar in a large bowl with electric mixer for 5 minutes, or until light and fluffy. Beat in eggs, one at a time. Mix in sour cream, food coloring, and vanilla. Gradually beat in flour mixture on low speed until just blended. Be careful not to overbeat. Spoon batter into 30 paper-lined muffin cups, filling each about 2/3 full.
4. Bake for 20 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool for five minutes on wire rack. Remove from pans and let cool completely.
5. To make frosting: Beat cream cheese, butter, sour cream, and vanilla in a large bowl until light and fluffy. Gradually beat in confectioners' sugar until smooth. Frost cupcakes when cool.

 Next Time: Irish Soda Bread and The Quiet Man 

Rum Cake and The Apartment

Hello, bloggers! I am back and I have great news…I am engaged! I am very excited about this, of course, and eager to start this new chapter in my life. But don’t worry. I have not forgotten about my other true love: baking. And in the month of January, I find that I love baking even more, though I usually don’t have enough time to actually bake something from scratch. After the holidays, the public schools have a long period of uninterrupted vacations and then I have to give out midterm exams to my students, leading to many days where I want nothing more than to drink chamomile tea and head straight to the warm covers of my bed. But that just makes the pleasure of taking a fresh-baked cake out of the oven, when I do have the time to make one, so much more enjoyable.

Unlike many people, I actually love the month of January. It is crackling with the anticipation of the coming spring. The nights are hushed and still, with the moon providing lacy-white and sophisticated illumination through the bare tree branches. The stores in the local shopping mall start displaying jaunty sundresses and pastel windbreakers to signal the coming spring. One of my favorite January traditions occurs at the beginning of the month, on the holiday of the Epiphany, when I make a splashy King Cake decorated with green, yellow, and purple sugars (I make another King Cake on Mardi Gras). To me, the cake, with its bright jeweled tones and circular, sun-like shape, reminds me that life is bursting through underneath the snow. So to celebrate January, I chose one of the most life-affirming movies ever: Billy Wilder’s The Apartment. Here are Dan’s thoughts.

The Apartment

Much was made of Billy Wilder’s boldness in directing The Apartment, a film that so forcefully knocks down the barriers of the Production Code. Credit should be given where credit is due, but the initial shock stirred by the film buried its humane qualities. The label “dirty fairytale”, while comically not unfit, detracts from the ultimate message about becoming a mensch, a human in other words.

 It’s no easier to dislike C.C. Baxter than it is to dislike Jack Lemmon himself, but the fact of the matter is, he will do anything to move up in the business world, including loaning his flat to philandering higher ups at his firm. He never sees the women being hurt by the flings he is enabling, until Ms. Kubelik, the sweet elevator girl at his firm played by Shirley MacLaine, puts a face on them. Every man at the firm has his eye on her, but only Baxter’s love is sincere. The conflict arises when Baxter discovers that Ms. Kubelik is his big boss’s mistress.

 

            No, no one in The Apartment is entirely innocent or blameless for their misfortunes. But the object of the movie is to watch Baxter and Kubelik evolve into decency and discovering that there are more important things in life than success. Throughout there are tears and smiles, as well as insight into what it meant to be a man toward the end of the Eisenhower years.

After striking gold with Some Like it Hot the previous year, Wilder was eager to work with Jack Lemmon again. In The Apartment he pulled more out of his performance, showing sides of Lemmon not seen before and this is where the heart of The Apartment lies. We can see from the start that Baxter is a good man with the all too human fault of letting his desire for success cloud his integrity. It takes a special woman to bring out his inner mensch. Because of what Baxter and Ms. Kubelik bring out in each other, we can forgive them their past mistakes and applaud the happy ending. For once, a movie has taken sympathy on two people who truly deserve it.

 Thanks, Dan!

In honor of The Apartment and its martini-drinking characters, I made a swanky old-fashioned rum cake. Normally I’m not crazy about rum cakes, but Dan likes them, and this was a birthday present for him. I must say that I was very impressed with the cake. It’s unbelievably soft and balances the rum flavor very well. It’s also healthy and has a creamy texture, a must for me when it comes to cakes (there’s nothing I hate more than a dry cake. Yick!) So enjoy…responsibly!

Rum Cake

Adapted from Taste of Home: Healthy Cooking Magazine

Ingredients:

• ½ cup chopped pecans, toasted
• 1 package yellow cake mix (kind with pudding in the mix)
• ½ cup skim milk
• ¼ cup dark rum
• ¼ cup canola oil
• ¼ cup unsweetened applesauce
• 2 eggs

Glaze:

• ½ cup sugar
• ¼ cup butter, cubed
• 2 Tbsp water
• 2 Tbsp dark room

1)      Coat a 10-in. fluted bundt cake pan with nonstick cooking spray. Sprinkle with a little bit of flour. Sprinkle pecans evenly around the bottom of the pan.

2)      In a large bowl, combine the cake mix, milk, rum, canola oil, applesauce and eggs. Beat on low speed for 30 seconds; then beat on medium for about 2 minutes.

3)      Pour batter into prepared pan. Bake at 325 degrees Fahrenheit for 40-45 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean. Cool 10 minutes before inverting from a pan to a wire rack to cool completely.

4)      In a small saucepan, combine glaze ingredients. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and cook and stir for 4-5 minutes or until thickened. Drizzle over cake.

Next time: Red Velvet and Casablanca

Sour Cherry Muffins and Fight Club

Everyone has a decade that speaks to them. For me, it is the 90s. I'm a child of the 90s (I turned 10 in 1999), and any mention of the pop culture from the decade is sure to send me into fits of fervent nostalgia. I love revisiting the crazy fashions in The Baby-Sitters Club books and embarrassing myself by listening to childhood favorites Backstreet Boys, N*Sync, and the Spice Girls. I was thrilled to discover that Are You Afraid of the Dark? and Sabrina the Teenage Witch are available on YouTube, ripe for some guilty-pleasure rewatching. While I'm not ready to bust out my platform shoes and butterfly clips again, I do love 90s nostalgia.

Of  course, one of the best parts of looking back at the 1990s is discovering aspects of the decade that I was way too young to know about back when I was actually living in that decade. For example, I am a huge fan of Nirvana and Oasis, two groups that did not register on my boy-band heavy radar back in the 1990s. And in terms of film, I would have to nominate 1999's Fight Club as one of the best new-discoveries-as-an-adult. I remember that even into the mid-2000s, when I was in high school, Fight Club was the cool movie to watch. At first, I had no desire to see Fight Club. I remember telling a friend of mine that I thought it was little more than a pretenious excuse to show off Brad Pitt's abs! However, once I did actually watch it, I was struck by the film...its tone, its characters, its biting script, everything. Far from the violent spectacle I was expecting, Fight Club is a sharp, darkly comedic satire about 1990s consumerism. It is one of those rare movies that you can watch over and over again, because each time, I have discovered something new to admire or analyze in its twisty storyline. Of course, it helps that it features Edward Norton, Brad Pitt, and Helena Bonham Carter, three of the best actors of our generation. So brace yourself, here are Dan's thoughts:

Fight Club:

Whoa, does Fight Club ever pack a punch! Here we have one of the weirdest, most talked-about, and most controversial movies of 1999, a year with now shortage of weird, talked-about, and controversial films.

Superficially, it can be described easily. A narrator (not named in the film, but played by Edward Norton in an outstanding performance) is fed up with life, his humdrum job, and the plasticity of the world he inhabits. In other words, he represents any one of us in the late 1990s. Enter Tyler, the free-spirited, anarchic leader of an underground fight club played by Brad Pitt. Tyler offers an alternative to life which is undoubtedly exciting and even makes sense at times, but it becomes increasingly dangerous and ultimately deadly.

What does all of this mean? I think of Fight Club as a warning. We better get off our butts, get our lives in order, and learn to live life both fully and productively, or the dangerous Tyler inside all of us will appear.

So sensational were the reactions to the film, however, that the message got lost. Tyler became something of an icon for lost young male souls and dangerous imitations began popping up. For better or worse (and it would be for better if the true meaning of the film was understood), Fight Club hit us and got a reaction out of us. People responded and, twelve years later, we are still talking about it. What bigger indicators of a great movie can you ask for?

Thanks, Dan! Now, recipe time.

So what makes sour cherry muffins appropriate for Fight Club? Well, first of all, I made these late at night in my scarcely-illuminated kitchen, and that reminded me of the scene where the Narrator and Tyler are making soap in the Narrator's kitchen (don't worry, the ingredients of these muffins are nowhere near as gross as the ingredients of Tyler's soap). Second of all, as my mom pointed out, muffins are common items in office place conference rooms, so there's a bit of the Narrator's pre-Tyler life thrown in. Finally, the taste of the sour cherry really packs a surprising punch, just as the movie does, literally and figuratively.

These muffins were adapted from the Williams-Sonoma book aptly entitled Muffins. Williams-Sonoma has never steered me wrong in the past, and I love how unique their recipes are. For example, these aren't ordinary sour cherry muffins, as they are topped with a coconut streusel! These were easy to make but, of course, everyone loved eating them even more! I only wish that sour cherries were easier to find. Next time I make these, I would like to use an even sourer kind of cherry than the one I could find for these.

Sour Cherry Muffins
From Williams Sonoma: Muffins 
Ingredients:
For coconut streusel

• 1/3 cup firmly packed light brown sugar
• 1/3 cup all-purpose flour
• 1/4 cup cold unsalted butter, cut into pieces
• 1/2 cup sweetened flaked coconut

For muffins 

• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1/2 cup granulated sugar
• 4 tsps baking powder
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/4 cup unsalted butter, melted
• 2 large eggs, beaten (I used EggBeaters)
• 1 cup fat-free half-and-half
• 16 oz jarred or canned pitted sour pie cherries, drained and dried

1) Preheat the oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit. Grease a muffin pan with butter-flavored nonstick cooking spray.
2) For the streusel, stir together the brown sugar and flour in a small bowl. Mash in the butter pieces with a fork until the mixture is crumbly. Stir in the coconut. Set aside.
3) For the muffins, stir together the flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt in a large bowl.
4) In another bowl, whisk together the melted butter, eggs, and half-and-half. Make a dent in the center of the dry ingredients add the egg mixture. Beat until the ingredients are combined and the mixture is thick and creamy. Be careful not to overmix (the batter will be lumpy).
5) Spoon a little of the batter into each muffin cup. Drop in a few cherries, and then cover those cherries with more batter. Drop in a few more cherries, and then cover with batter until cups are filled to the rim. Sprinkle each with a heaping tablespoon of the coconut streusel.
6) Bake for 20-25 minutes, or until the muffins are golden and spring back when lightly touched. Transfer to a wire rack and let cool for 5 minutes. Unmold the muffins. Serve warm or at room temperature.

Next week: Key lime pie and Some Like it Hot.