remembering grandma in her cinnamon rolls

I don’t know that I could ever consider myself a baker. Mainly because I don’t keep bakers’ hours.

(Also, I only just recently learned that a baker’s dozen is actually thirteen. And while I’ve looked into it, I still haven’t found a worthy explanation for why exactly this is the case.)

Though I do quite enjoy the act of baking. And I certainly adore its results. It’s just that I won’t wake up at 4:00am unless it’s for something especially exciting, like catching an early flight or leaving on a road trip or to answer the door for balloons and a big giant check. Even then I’d probably be groggy and not easy to handle.

And while I was dragging still at 9:00am this Saturday, I began the process – which I have formerly underestimated – of making my grandma’s cinnamon rolls. At first, it didn’t look like it was going well. In my early morning stupor, I dropped everything I touched and couldn’t for the life of me open this can of evaporated milk.

I felt a little bit like a civilized criminal. Like I was being forced to siphon the last drops of available evaporated milk following a tragic dairy spill.

My grandma’s “Twisters”, as she called them, woke her several early weekend mornings before the sun had risen – probably just a few short hours after the rest of us had gone to sleep – so that she could pass them out to anyone and everyone who might stop by. You see, she was much more of a baker than I’ll ever be.

She was a woman of preparation and presentation, there’s no doubt about that. A lot like these cinnamon rolls, she took a lot of time to make you feel special. (The rolls take a collective 3 hours to rise). A meal at her house began hours before you arrived, and her years of restaurant experience manifested itself in flawless fine dining tabletop aesthetics, no matter the occasion.

And I really mean it when I say she was prepared for everything. The moment a dark cloud formed in the sky, she set her flashlight by the stairs to her basement in case the need for shelter suddenly arose. She knit a blanket to give to each of her grandchildren for their wedding long before they had even met their significant other, and stowed them in her closet for the later date. And a week before that later date, she would begin baking cakes which she would one day prior cover in white frosting and situate into a multi-tiered, bride-and-groom-topped masterpiece.

But most heartwarmingly to me, she placed a strip of masking tape under nearly every item in her home, directing those things to their new homes after she was gone. Holidays at her house were often spent jokingly looking under lamps, tables, and other keepsakes, finding out who got what. I say ‘jokingly’, because all any of us ever really hoped for was her. A piece of her to carry with us. And things aren’t always perfect at accomplishing this.

But because she had chosen so thoughtfully what each person should have, I get this feeling that these things will remain things no longer. They will now forever be a piece of her. Take this bowl, for instance. This bowl that is at least fifty years old:

I found my name on masking tape beneath this bowl (as well as a ceramic turkey napkin holder, but I’ll put that on hold until Thanksgiving) and put it to use for the first time this weekend, just as grandma did, making her cinnamon rolls.

I really didn’t want to disappoint her legacy, or my family, by falling short on this baking endeavor, so I took the piece of her that came with this bowl and crossed my fingers. Since I spent many days over at her house when I was growing up, I had helped make these cinnamon rolls before. But I had never seen the kneading and rising process. That part had happened long before I had even thought about greeting the day. Once you’ve mixed the butter, milk, eggs, sugar, and flour in the bowl, you continue adding flour until the dough is no longer sticky. And I now know why we spent summer mornings trimming coupons for flour. I estimate it takes between 8-10 cups of flour in the end.

And it’s so worth it, because the dough becomes this pillow of a thing, rising to meet you after you’ve left it sit for any amount of time. Once you’ve allowed it to rise the first round, for one hour, it nearly explodes out of the bowl. So you punch it down, and then help it back up again by letting it rest for another hour. It’s amazing to me how dough has a mind of its own.

Finally rolling out the dough is gratifying either because its such smooth dough to work with, or because you’ve been waiting at least two hours to get your hands on it.

It was a little bit like riding a bike once I got to the part that I remember. Rolling out the dough, cutting into strips, twisting and dipping in melted butter and then brown sugar and cinnamon.

And it all just smelled a lot like, well, grandma.

In the end they turned out a lot like I remember, actually. Though they did rise up a bit over the sides of the pans, while hers seemed pristinely manufactured with perfect edges and uniform shape.

But I’m not perfect. And if there’s one thing she taught me with the utmost tenderness, it’s that being imperfect is perfectly fine.

Because just like stepping into her house, recognizing from the scent in the air that cinnamon rolls had been in the works since early that morning, things (and food, especially) are much more about what you recognize within them than how perfectly they might appear.

So maybe I’ll never be a baker. But I’ll remember her every time I make her cinnamon rolls.

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