Almond Bars — The Bars We Made Together When Spring Demanded Something Sweet

April. The anniversary of Kevin's wedding two years ago. The anniversary of nothing this year — Kevin is divorcing, Crystal is in Ohio, and the chapel at Fort Campbell where they said "I do" is just a building again. Anniversaries are cruel when the thing they commemorate has ended. I didn't mention it. Kevin didn't mention it. The silence around it was loud enough.

Amber is enormous. Seven months pregnant with twins and she looks like she's smuggling two watermelons under her shirt. She FaceTimed me on Sunday and turned sideways and I actually gasped. "I KNOW," she said. "I'm a HOUSE." She's not a house. She's a woman carrying two people and the carrying is making her tired and swollen and radiant in the way that only pregnant women in their third trimester are radiant — glowing because the body is working so hard it produces its own light. Haley and Madison. Due in May. Less than two months. My sister is about to become a mother of twins and I am about to become an aunt and the Mitchell family is about to add two more to the roster. The roster is getting long. The table is getting bigger. We're going to need more chairs.

Elijah is walking everywhere and getting into everything. He found the cabinet under the sink (the baby lock failed — Mitchell babies are lockpick-resistant) and pulled out every sponge, bottle of dish soap, and scrub brush. He arranged them on the kitchen floor in a pattern that looked intentional but was definitely random. Then he sat among them like a king on a throne of cleaning supplies. I took a photo. The photo will be in his graduation slideshow someday. Every family needs a photo of their child surrounded by sponges. It's a developmental milestone that the books don't mention.

Work is good. Full schedule. The community screening program is going to restart in person — the first in-person screening since before the pandemic. May. In Madison. The community center. The same place where I got vaccinated. The circle closes. The screenings are coming back. The people are coming back. Wanda is already organizing volunteers. The program served ninety-three people in September 2019, the last in-person event. I want to beat that number. I want the first post-pandemic screening to say: we're still here. We didn't stop. We adjusted and we waited and we're back and the toothbrushes are free and the dental hygienist is ready and nothing — not a pandemic, not a lockdown, not a year of Zoom — could stop this.

I made lemon bars — because spring demands lemon and because Chloe found the recipe in ChopChop magazine and wanted to try it and because saying yes to a nine-year-old who wants to bake lemon bars is the only correct answer. She made them mostly alone. I zested. She did everything else. The lemon bars were tangy and sweet and the powdered sugar on top drifted onto the counter like snow in April. The bars were perfect. The collaboration continues. The kitchen gets smaller as the cooks get bigger, but the food keeps getting better. That's the tradeoff. I'll take it every time.

Chloe has decided that spring means baking, and I have decided that Chloe is correct about most things. The lemon bars were her idea and her project, but the spirit of that afternoon — the two of us at the counter, her doing most of the work, me zesting and staying out of the way — is the same spirit I bring to these almond bars every time I make them. Bar cookies are forgiving and generous, which is exactly the kind of recipe you want when the cook is nine and the kitchen is small and the whole point is the doing of it together.

Almond Bars

Prep Time: 15 min | Cook Time: 25 min | Total Time: 40 min | Servings: 24 bars

Ingredients

• 1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened
• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 1/2 cups granulated sugar, divided
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 2 large eggs
• 1 teaspoon almond extract
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1/2 cup sliced almonds
• Powdered sugar for dusting (optional)

Instructions

1. Preheat and prep. Preheat your oven to 350°F. Grease a 9x13-inch baking pan or line it with parchment paper, leaving a slight overhang on the sides for easy lifting.
2. Make the base. Beat the softened butter with 1 cup of the granulated sugar until light and fluffy, about 2–3 minutes. Mix in the flour and salt until a soft dough forms. Press the dough evenly into the bottom of the prepared pan.
3. Mix the topping. In a separate bowl, whisk together the eggs, remaining 1/2 cup sugar, almond extract, and vanilla extract until smooth and slightly pale, about 1 minute.
4. Assemble. Pour the egg mixture evenly over the pressed dough base. Scatter the sliced almonds across the top in an even layer.
5. Bake. Bake for 22–26 minutes, until the top is set and lightly golden at the edges and the almonds are just toasted. The center should not jiggle when you nudge the pan.
6. Cool and cut. Let the bars cool completely in the pan — at least 30 minutes — before cutting into squares or rectangles. Dust with powdered sugar just before serving if you’d like a little extra sweetness and that snow-on-the-counter effect.

Nutrition (per serving)

Calories: 165 | Protein: 2g | Fat: 9g | Carbs: 20g | Fiber: 1g | Sodium: 45mg