As a child I spent parts of my summer vacation with my mother’s relatives, mostly her sister. My Aunt Jo had two daughters my age, and since my own sister was five years my senior and wanted nothing to do with me, having two playmates who actually wanted my company was a welcome change. I went from my rustic home on the farm to the relatively urban life of Beverly, where my cousins had a swimming pool in their tiny backyard, and walked down busy streets to find ice cream stands and pizza parlors. My aunt would hand us some cash and we would be off for the afternoon, crossing through the edge of a golf course and skittling over crosswalks to get to our destination.
Living in someone else’s home came with temporary responsibilities in the form of chores written out by my aunt in flowery, left-handed penmanship that I found impossible to read. When we woke up in the morning she had already gone to her job at the hospital, and it was our turn to get to work. My cousins translated little stacks of papers describing duties such as, “dust the left shelves under the stairs” or “wipe down the boot rack”. My aunt had raised five children and left nothing to chance. Weekdays had a normal ebb and flow, and could even be boring despite the novelty of a pool to play in. It was the weekends that were exciting, for that brought visiting grownups. We looked forward to the noise and activity, but specifically yearned for a visit from my grandfather, “Papa”, we called him (rhymes with “cuppa”) for he always came with pastries on Sunday mornings.
Like any other area, New England has its traditions. One of the most legendary and longed-for are Jordan Marsh’s blueberry muffins. In those days there was a Jordan Marsh Bakery next door in Peabody, just a couple of miles away from Aunt Jo’s house. If we were lucky, the huge muffins (which could only fit four to a box) would still be warm by the time we consumed them. Papa wasn’t the most animated man, but when he opened the door holding boxes of pastries his face beamed with a smile. We came running when we heard the door slam shut and embraced him, our nostrils inhaling the smell of tobacco and leather, wrapping our arms around his skinny frame. He called out a loud “Hi everybody!” and plopped down the Boston Sunday Globe on my aunt’s table, which in those days weighed five pounds. We greedily snapped the string on the boxes of muffins, but there was one new diminutive delicacy that was sized just for children – donut holes, which Dunkin’ Donuts had just started selling.
Before 1972, Dunkin’ Donuts sold two things – round donuts and coffee, and Papa had been bringing a dozen donuts to his daughter’s house every Sunday for years. Various relatives gathered around the large kitchen table each week, sipping and smoking, savoring the delicious sugary pastries and sharing sections of the Globe. This had been a long-time tradition, but when “Dunkin’ Munchkins” were launched in the mid-70s it was a red flag to us children begging for a treat. Now we had size on our side, some negotiating power. The Munchkins were small, and so were we. Where we might have been denied a whole jelly donut in the past (after all who wants to feed their kids that much sugar) we could finagle the availability of plenty of Munchkins on the grounds that they were tiny. Never mind that we consumed enough of them to equal more than one donut, it seemed like a miniature treat. And so Papa’s routine changed due to the marketing campaign of a major New England donut store.
These were moments from my childhood that I remember fondly now, especially since Jordan Marsh muffins are a thing of the past. All the adults who sat around the kitchen table are gone now. I am left with my memories, and the urge to recreate a similar Sunday morning tradition. These days my tastes have moved away from sugar-bombed pastries to more savory treats like scones or croissants, but I still live in that little farm house in the country and a visit to a decent bakery means getting in the car and driving 20 minutes. But isn’t that what Papa did? I asked my neighbor and friend, Fran, if she wanted to reboot the old tradition with me.
Yesterday morning we drove to the Panera in Newburyport and chose some pastries, vowing to visit earlier next Sunday when the selection wouldn’t be so picked over. Next, we went to get the Boston Sunday Globe, but also came home with the New York Sunday Times and the more local Sunday Eagle Tribune too, to make sure there was enough reading material. Two hours of happy time were spent at the table reading and laughing, listening to classical music and eating croissants. Next Sunday we’ll go to a little bakery in Haverhill, or maybe even try making some Jordan Marsh muffins.
While you can never recreate your childhood, sometimes you can take the best bits of a memory and make new traditions. Fran and I had a good time during our first inaugural “croissunday” and look forward to many more.
Karen Brockelbank
October 30, 2023
https://www.mashed.com/1389770/iconic-origins-jordan-marsh-blueberry-muffins/
https://www.boston.com/news/business/2013/06/05/a-history-of-dunkin-donuts/
