pancakes

Seltzer Water Pancakes

/ Shane / Leave a comment

The first Friday of the month is reserved for recipes. You can see additional First Friday Food posts here.

The Reason:

My brother mentioned making pancakes that used the fizziness of seltzer to help them rise, which I had never heard of. And, well, I like pancakes, so.

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The Journey:

I don’t think you really need a mixer to make pancakes. It is debateable whether it’s worth it at all, since I need to dirty a spoon for dropping them on the pan anyway. On the other hand, this stand mixer just sits there on the counter taking up space and demanding to be used to justify its existence, so why not?

Plus, it’s purty in pictures.

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The seltzer was indeed quite dramatic, with all the fizzing. I would imagine that kids would find this fun, or else just showing off in front of people. “And now, the secret ingredient!” you proclaim with a flourish, making a bubbly pancake volcano.

But mostly it’s just me in the kitchen, making volcanoes by myself, so much of the effect is wasted.

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The Verdict:

I gotta be honest: they were okay, but nothing special. They’re very, very similar to the Oatmeal-Yogurt Pancakes. The seltzer water, though dramatic, didn’t really make that much of a difference over traditional methods as far as fluffiness of the pancakes. There was nothing wrong with them, but since we don’t keep seltzer water in the house I probably won’t make these again.

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The Recipe:

Recipe from I Heart Eating:

  • 2 c. all-purpose flour
  • 2 T. granulated sugar
  • 1/2 tsp. salt
  • 1 c. plain yogurt
  • 2 tsp. baking soda
  • 1 1/3 c. sparkling seltzer water
  • 2 eggs, lightly beaten
  • Butter
  1. In a large bowl, sift together the flour, sugar, and salt.
  2. In a separate small bowl, stir together the yogurt and baking soda; let sit for 10 minutes.
  3. Add the yogurt mixture, seltzer, and eggs to the flour mixture; whisk until just combined.
  4. Let batter rest for 10 minutes.
  5. Meanwhile, heat butter in a skillet or on a griddle over medium heat.
  6. Scoop about 1/4 cup of batter onto skillet, gently spreading out each portion of batter.
  7. Cook pancakes until bubbles begin to form around edges, about 2 minutes.
  8. Flip each pancake with a spatula, and cook until golden brown, about 2 minutes more.
  9. Repeat with remaining batter, re-buttering skillet as needed.

Peach Dutch Baby

/ Shane / 3 Comments

The first Friday of the month is reserved for recipes. You can see additional First Friday Food posts here.

The Reason:

Speaking of traditions, we have one around here called Pancake Sunday. As such, we are in constant search of new pancake recipes.

The Journey:

I mean, first off, peaches. Yummy, in-season, late summer peaches; I’m not quite as sure about October peaches. Unless you trust your peach-dealer implicitly, you might want to put this one in your back pocket for a bit (sorry I didn’t get this one out in a more timely fashion!)

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A dutch baby is like making one big, enormous pancake. It’s German in origin, stemming from a corruption of deutsch. You pour everything in a cast-iron skillet and bake it like a cake (now that’s what I call a pancake!). Plus you get to say you’re eating a “dutch baby”, which the kids think is pretty hilarious.

peach skillet

Honestly, the only downside to pancake day is that you have to make all of the pancakes. Standing over a hot stove for an hour, flipping pancake after pancake…a dutch baby, though, just set it and forget it. WAY easier (though there are a lot fewer leftovers).

dutch baby

The Verdict:

This recipe is amazing. I have been intrigued by the idea of dutch babies for a long time, but I’ve tried a few recipes with “meh” results. This one, though…this one is solid gold. Delicious, juicy, golden peach-gold.

peaches

The Recipe:

Recipe from FiveHeartHome.

  • 3 tablespoons sugar, divided
  • 1 teaspoon cinnamon, divided
  • 2 cups peeled, sliced peaches (about 3 peaches)
  • 2 tablespoons butter
  • 3 eggs
  • 1/2 cup milk
  • 1/2 cup white whole wheat flour
  • 1/8 teaspoon salt
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • Powdered sugar
  1. Preheat oven to 400°F.
  2. In a medium bowl, blend 2 tablespoons sugar with 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon. Stir in peach slices and toss until evenly coated.
  3. Place butter in a 9 to 10-inch glass pie plate or ovenproof skillet. Place dish in oven for a couple of minutes until butter is melted. Use a potholder to remove dish from oven and swirl to evenly coat bottom with melted butter.
  4. Spread peach slices over butter in an even layer and return to oven to bake for 10 minutes.
  5. While peaches are baking, pour eggs, milk, flour, salt, vanilla, and remaining 1 tablespoon sugar and 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon in a blender. Blend on medium speed for 1 minute. Once peaches have baked, remove dish from oven with a potholder and slowly pour batter over peaches.
  6. Bake for 20 minutes or until pancake is golden brown and puffy. Allow to cool for a few minutes on a wire rack (it will significantly deflate) before dusting with powdered sugar, slicing, and serving warm.

Oatmeal-Yogurt Pancakes with Blackberry Crush

/ Shane / 2 Comments

The first Friday of the month is reserved for recipes. You can see additional First Friday Food posts here.

The Reason:

Pancakes.

Also, if you’re some kind of crazy person and you need a second reason, I just so happened to stumble across this recipe on the day we had bought some random blackberries for no reason at all.

Kismet.

Pancake kismet (the only kind I’m interested in).

The Journey:

The thing that originally piqued my interest was the oats. It turns out, they just sort of disappear into it; you really can’t tell they’re in there. So it’s a great way to include something a little different than your standard flour.

blackberry pancakes

They have yogurt in them too, and since I absolutely love the Russian yogurt pancakes, that was a draw. The nice thing about this one, though, is that it uses a lot less yogurt. We often don’t have enough yogurt on hand to do the yogurt pancakes.

Plus the fruit topping, although you could really put that on any kind of pancakes. The first time we made it we also had homemade whipped cream, which really was the magnum opus of pancakes. (Obviously, it works with strawberries as well as blackberries.)

cooking strawberries

The Verdict:

These are my current favorite pancake. I think we made them 4 weeks in a row. I cannot overstate how delicious and wonderful they are.

I keep meaning to reduce the butter, but somehow I never quite get around to it…

strawberry pancakes

The Recipe:

Recipe from the Whole Grains Council:

For the Blackberry Crush:

  • 2 cups fresh blackberries (or other fruit)
  • 1/4 cup turbinado sugar
  • 1/4 cup maple syrup

For the Pancakes:

  • 1 2/3 cups white whole-wheat flour
  • 2/3 cup old-fashioned rolled oats
  • 2 tbsp granulated sugar
  • 1 1/4 tsp baking powder
  • 1/4 heaping tsp baking soda of soda
  • 1/4 tsp salt
  • 1 cup Greek yogurt, plus more for garnish
  • 1 cup whole milk
  • 4 tbsp unsalted butter, melted, plus more for the pan
  • 2 large eggs

To make the Blackberry Crush:

  1. Combine the blackberries and sugar in a medium bowl and mash slightly with a fork.
  2. Strain the juice into a small pot and reserve the berries.
  3. Heat the juice over medium heat and simmer until it is thick, syrupy, and easily coats the back of the spoon, about 8 minutes.
  4. Remove from the heat and stir in the maple syrup. Cool slightly, and pour over the berries. Adjust the sweetness with additional maple syrup if needed. Set the syrup aside.

To make the pancakes:

  1. Whisk together flour, oats, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in a large bowl.
  2. In a separate bowl, whisk together the yogurt, milk, the melted butter, and eggs. Make a well in the center of the dry ingredients, and whisk in the wet ingredients until well incorporated. The batter should be thick, with little tiny bubbles on the surface.

Whole Wheat Gingerbread Pancakes

/ Shane / 1 Comment

The first Friday of the month is reserved for recipes. You can see additional First Friday Food posts here.

The Reason:

Although gingerbread kind of says “Christmas”, this is not a Christmas recipe per se, which is why it’s okay to post it in January. Anyway, I didn’t find this one until after the last food post was up, and it’s too good to keep it from you for a whole year.

And, pancakes.

The Journey:

I removed the brown sugar from the original recipe. It seemed like a lot of sugar on top of all of that molasses, but despite that the pancakes didn’t taste that sweet. Anyway, I get my sweetness by way of slathering on the maple syrup, which is much more directly on my tongue, so the pancakes themselves don’t need to be all that sweet. So I took it out and they were just as good without it, so you can thank me later. (Not to mention that I halved the salt like I usually do, so your heart can thank me later as well.)

Did I mention there was a lot of molasses?

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I’m not sure I’ve ever really shown my full pancake setup here, but yeah, we’re kind of crazy. I mean, you guys know I’m obsessed with pancakes, but we usually make a triple batch for the 4 of us. I am not kidding.

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And that’s just Evie’s plate!

 

The Verdict:

They say a picture is worth a thousand words, so:

pancake stack

The Recipe:

Recipe adapted from Cookie and Kate (coincidentally, second month in a row!):

  • 1 cup whole wheat flour
  • 1 tablespoon baking powder
  • 1/8 teaspoon salt
  • 1 teaspoon powdered ginger
  • 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
  • 1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
  • 1 egg
  • 1 cup milk
  • 3 tablespoons unsulphured molasses
  • 1/2 teaspoon vanilla
  • 2 tablespoons butter, melted and cooled
  1. In a medium mixing bowl, whisk together the dry ingredients (flour, baking powder, salt, ginger, cinnamon, nutmeg and brown sugar).
  2. In a smaller bowl, whisk the egg and then whisk in the milk, molasses, vanilla and melted butter. Slowly pour the wet mixture into the dry mixture, stirring as you pour, until the flour is just incorporated.
  3. Heat a griddle, cast-iron pan or non-stick pan over medium-low heat. It’s hot enough when a drop of water sizzles against the pan. Grease the pan with a pat of butter or non-stick cooking spray. Give the bowl one more stir and pour 1/3 cup batter into the pan. Flip when the perimeter of the pancake is no longer shiny (these pancakes don’t develop many of the tell-tale bubbles around the edges so they can be a bit tricky). Serve the cooked pancake immediately or keep warm in an oven set to 200 degrees Fahrenheit. Repeat with remaining pancakes, adjusting heat as necessary to achieve pancakes that are cooked through and golden brown on both sides.

Crêpes!

/ Shane / 1 Comment

The first Friday of the month is reserved for recipes. You can see additional First Friday Food posts here.

The Reason:

I’m still trying to burn through some of my stored-up food posts, and that means pancakes! So you’re getting another First Friday Food that is not on a First Friday.

As far as the reason to make crepes, one day it just occurred to me that I could make crepes. With whole wheat flour no less! We’re always looking for good pancake recipes, and crepes are a significantly different form of pancake.

The Journey:

First off, I’d like to specify that I originally learned how to make crepes from an actual frenchman. I don’t have his fancy pan or fancy crepe-scraping tool, but make no mistake, I know how to get the job done.

All that being said, flipping crepes is no joke, even if you don’t flip them in the air. There is certainly a skill to it. Be prepared to have ripped up and shredded crepes, even after making hundreds and hundreds of the things. Making crepes is somewhat stressful, and requires your full attention. But afterwards, you get to eat crepes, and the ripped up ones taste the same as the nice ones!

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The recipe calls for the ingredients to be mixed in a blender. Do it! I tried everything I could to avoid it, including mixing with a mixer. It doesn’t work. If you get chunks in your batter, they will stick to the pan, and then you’re not going to get nice looking ones.

Also, use a LOT of butter on the pan, in between each and every crepe. You really can’t over-butter it. Just remind yourself you’re cooking like a French person, and throw an extra pat on there. You’ll thank yourself when you try to flip one.

The Verdict:

Making crepes is not that difficult, but it is a LOT of work. You have to make LOTS of them, because people will eat them way faster than you can make them. It’s a marathon, not a sprint.

But, might I add, they make you look very fancy pants impressive.

Crepes are so versatile. You can basically put anything on a crepe. Even setting aside savory crepes, you have jellies, jams, curds, marmalades, peanut butter, nutella, and just plain sugar. You could have these every day of the week and not get tired of them.

Well, not get tired of *eating* them. But you will definitely get tired of making them.

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The Recipe:

Recipe from 100 Days of Real Food.

  • 3 eggs
  • 1 cup whole-wheat flour
  • 1 cup milk
  • ¾ cup water
  • 1 tablespoon honey
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla
  • ¼ teaspoon salt
  • 1 tablespoon butter, melted + extra for cooking
  1. Put all ingredients in blender and mix well. Let stand about 15 minutes.
  2. Melt and swirl around a small pat of butter in an 8 or 10-inch frying pan over medium heat.
  3. Angle pan and pour enough batter on one side to thinly and evenly cover the pan. Very quickly swirl the batter around to cover the pan in one thin layer.
  4. Immediately use your cooking spatula to push down the thin edges of the crepe around the perimeter.
  5. After about 1 minute (and once it is golden brown on the bottom) carefully flip it over without tearing the crepe.
  6. Fry for 1 more minute on the other side (until it is golden brown as well) and then roll up each crepe.