snack: pumpkin spice muffin
drink: caramel latte
being an "adult" is pretty awesome, huh? my favorite part is the part where you have to have a job & support yourself or you starve to death or get put out on the street. ever since i first became an "adult" a few decades back, i've gone through three periods of time where my job was "eliminated" & i had to rely on government assistance to survive whilst i've looked for a new job. the first two times both lasted a few months & both times i'd spend many a morning riding the F train a few stops through brooklyn to the furthest west corner of prospect park where, in an effort to wake up & get my ass out of the house & get the day moving, i'd grab breakfast at connecticut muffin.
the third time after my job was eliminated is happening RIGHT NOW so the other day i got all nostalgic & shizz & decided to hop the train over to my old haunt. there are six connecticut muffin locations here in brooklyn & i've been to all of them, but the prospect park one will always be my favorite, despite the fact that its tables are often clogged with bebes & discarded copies of the ny times. technically, there's also a connecticut muffin in new canaan, CT, a fact that should make it ineligible for "only in ny" status, but the god-forsaken state of connecticut sucks & i don't recognize anything within its borders. DIE CT. plus, c'mon...who the f ever goes to new canaan? rich people? f'n glenn beck? maybe if it was the original connecticut muffin locale i might recognize it, but that distinction belongs to the park slope locale, so new canaan can go screw.
in addition to the obvious bounty of muffins, they've got a menu that features scones, bagels, cookies & sandwiches alongside a bevy of beverages, mostly ones of the coffee & tea-based variety. back in the day, i'd occasionally go big & order up their mozzarella & sun-dried tomato sandwich, but i usually went with my go-to combo--a pumpkin spice muffin & a medium caramel latte. on this particular day, i decided to stick with the familiar & revisit that combo. for a brief moment, i considered breaking tradition & getting the cherries & berries muffin, but i quickly came to my change-adverse senses & got the pumpkin spice one.
it's been a while since i've made it to a connecticut muffin & i've got to be honest with y'all...the pumpkin spice muffin isn't as amazing as i remember it being. i'm not sure what my pre-30-year-old self was thinking when i let myself get all obsessed with it but then again, i made a lot of foolish decisions at that age. it's not like it sucks or anything. it's pumpkiny & somewhat flavorful but the muffin top's a bit drier than i prefer. as you can tell from the below photo, it's got walnuts & flecks of sugar baked right into the top of it, which is cool. still, the top takes up a large portion of the muffin & while the bottom is moist enough, the muffin as a whole doesn't balance out as well as i'd prefer.
given the dryness of the muffin, a beverage is totally necessary. that's where the caramel latte comes in. other than a few coffee-tinged beers here & there, these days i'm still trying to avoid caffeine but in the interest of telling my exciting connecticut muffin story, i just had to treat myself to the lil bit of caffeine that's in the caramel latte. it's worth it. i'm no fancy coffee drink connoisseur, so it might actually be shitty as far as lattes go, but whatevs. this caramel latte's got just the right balance of coffee flavor & caramel sweetness & i love it. seriously. if i had an indispensable fancy coffee drink budget, i'd totally get them all the time.
all together, my snack-drink combo ran me just under $7 ($2.50 for the muffin & $4.35 for the latte). yeah, that's sort of pricey for a muffin & a fancy coffee drink, but i look at it this way: at least i'm not spending the same amount for the same exact thing at starbucks. now if i could just get connecticut muffin to do something about the first half of their name, i'd have no issue at all with giving them my hard-earned money.
connecticut muffin, 206 prospect park west, brooklyn, 718-965-2067