Mabel Gatling – Nana – was my maternal great aunt.  She lived in West Orange, New Jersey, where she owned the Charm beauty salon.  Nana was famous for many things, I suppose, but what I most remember is her monkey bread: those flaky slices of biscuit-like dough, cooked together in a round pan with a hole in its middle, which oh-so-easily pulled apart from one another. 

 

Nana was a grand lady: kind and classy, gracious and elegant.

 

 

Mabel’s Monkey Bread

 

½ cup vegetable shortening

¼ cup butter

½ cup sugar

1 teaspoon salt

 

1 cup slightly warm mashed potatoes (fresh)

½ cup lukewarm potato water

1 pkg. dry yeast (dissolved in potato water)

6 cups all purpose flour

1 tube pan

2 eggs

¾ cups lukewarm milk

¼ lb. melted butter

 

 

In a large mixing bowl, cream together the shortening, butter, sugar and salt.  Add mashed potatoes and continue mixing.  Add eggs and beat until mixture is light.  Add yeast dissolved in potato water.  Add one cup of flour, then 1/3 cup warm milk.  Mix in the second cup of flour, then add another 1/3 cup of the warm milk.  Mix in the third cup of flour and the last 1/3 cup of milk.  By now, the mixture will be too tough to continue mixing by hand.  Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured cold surface (preferably marble) and knead in the remaining 3 cups of flour.  Once all the flour has been incorporated, continue kneading the dough until it is smooth and satiny.  (You can see, feel and sense when it has all come together!)  Place the dough in a lightly oiled bowl, turning the dough to coat with oil.  Cover with towel and place in warm area to double in size – about 4 hours.  Divide dough into four sections and roll out each section on a lightly floured board – to about 1/3 thickness.  Cut with a cookie cutter (or glass) dipped lightly in melted butter and lay pieces around tube of pan.  Cover and let rise – about 4 hours.  Bake at 400 degrees for 20 minutes.  Reduce heat to 350 degrees and continue baking until done – about 55-60 minutes.  Serve piping hot with or without butter.  Let bread be pulled apart as served.

 

 

 

 

 

My grandmother – Clara – died in 1972, when I was just six.  In many ways, I became my Aunt Mabel’s grandson.  We spent many Thanksgivings at her home.  In her later years, Nana would often visit us during the holidays.  At the piano with her one Christmas Eve, she whispered in my ear as I played: you are special.

The Hairston Sisters

Mabel and Clara

 

 

 

 

 

Notes

 

When I called my mother for this family recipe, she wasn’t sure she actually had it, but assured me she would hunt it up.  A few days later, she e-mailed me this recipe, which was e-mailed to her from her sister – my Aunt Ceola.  It was just a few days before Thanksgiving and my plan was to make this dish for the family holiday table.  Not so much.  The two loaves coming out of my oven turned out not to be Thanksgiving ready – at least not for this year’s feast of gratitude.

 

My Aunt Mabel – Nana – passed on in 1982, when I was 16.  She’d had a stroke.  I remember sitting in her sick room, watching my aunts tend to Nana.  She didn’t know them: the stroke had taken her memory and her entire left side of feeling.

 

Just a few minutes after popping my two loaf pans into the 400-degree oven, I could smell the aromas of Nana’s 53 Ashland Avenue kitchen.  Twenty minutes later, however, I knew something was wrong: I could now smell burning crust.  I turned on the oven light to witness the dark brown tops of the bread loaves.  According to the original recipe, I had nearly 30 minutes of baking time left – at 350 degrees.  Instinctively, I knew those loaves wouldn’t hold up to all that additional cook time.  So I took one out and left the other in as a test.  After a minute or two of cooling time, I tasted the one loaf and, alas, I was once again a little boy, standing at the table, pulling those hot slices apart from one another, savoring the warmth and love oozing from the bread.  A few minutes later, I took the other loaf out, as it had become obvious to me that Nana’s 70s and 80s oven was very different from my 2K7 version.  After cooling on my countertop for 30 minutes, the outer layer of the bread loaves was hard as bricks, even while the yellow flaky insides somewhat resembled my childhood memories.

 

This is a recipe I’d have to test again, to get me closer to that heavenly bread made by my now heavenly Nana.

 

 

From the forthcoming book

Food Is Love: Recipes For Living Single & Fabulous!

© 2007 Robert Wesley Branch