Breakfast! Pancakes, syrup and more!
Jun. 1st, 2010 09:16 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
angel_negra in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
omnomnomI'm sad that no one's shared plain pancakes yet. So I shall fix that. And since pancakes are nothing without some good toppings, I'm including a recipe for pancake syrup as well as some other easy topping ideas.
First up:
Pancakes!
The recipe I have, which I got from a cookbook my grandma wrote up and bound herself, is actually titled "Marta's Pancakes", sadly, I do not know if Marta was family, friend or someone who'd submitted the recipe to a newspaper or magazine.
Ingredients:
2 eggs
1/2 tablespoon of sugar (or a bit more if you like sweet.)
1/2 teaspoon of salt
2 cups of milk
1 cup of flour
Now, I have a preference for thicker, fluffier pancakes than this mixture of ingredients creates, so I tend to add:
2 teaspoons of baking powder
approximately 1 more cup of flour (I tend to eyeball it, scooping up some and letting it pour back into the bowl to judge the thickness.)
Now for the fun adjustments. This is great for when you're craving chocolate and don't have any in the house. Once your batter's mixed, add some cocoa powder to the mix. I find that once the batter is similar in look to chocolate milk, I've added enough. This makes for great chocolate pancakes. (Adding chocolate chips to this just adds to the fun.)
For things like blueberry or chocolate chip pancakes, there are two ways to pull this off. Dump your berry/chip of choice into the batter and mix, or wait until you've poured the batter into the skillet and sprinkle in the chips/berries then. Berry juice will spread more into the mixture if you add it before pouring, and everything will be better covered in the batter, but it's really a matter of your personal tastes here.
Mix. Pour. Cook. :D
Generally, I like to beat the eggs first, then mix in salt and sugar, then beat in the baking powder until it's nice and foamy, then milk and I add flour last, going until it's my desired thickness. I like making the batter smooth, though a lot of people encourage leaving the batter texture slightly lumpy. (The lumpy method works especially well if you make the batter the night before and leave it in the fridge for the morning, it lets the baking powder expand on its own for a bit and gives you beautifully fluffy pancakes. I'm generally making my pancakes with the intent to eat them as soon as possible, and am making them because I'm not in the mood for more complicated cooking that night.)
When cooking pancakes, watch the edges of the cake on the skillet. Once the bubbles stop closing over after bursting, this is a good time to flip them. I also find that the edges will solidify a bit.
Now, Toppings!
How to Make Your Own Syrup. :D
This is a Brown Sugar Syrup, which tastes similar to corn syrup. I'll include the alternates for a maple syrup at the end for those who prefer that taste.
Ingredients:
2 cups brown sugar, firmly packed
1 cup water
Dash of salt
1/4 cup light corn syrup (optional)
Combine sugar, water and salt into a saucepan/pot and heat to boiling. Cover and cook at a moderate rate for about 10 minutes or until a light syrup is formed. (Keeping it covered at this stage prevents crystallizing on the sides of the pan/pot, but be careful when removing the lid, I find that it tends to stick to the pot a bit.)
Cool and put into a covered jar. (I tend to use an old corn syrup squirt bottle that I've washed out and saved.)
If more syrup is made than is needed immediately, the corn syrup may be cooked along with the sugar and water; this will prevent crystallization during the storage period. Keep in tightly covered jar either in or our of the refrigerator. Makes about two cups.
(Ok, the first time I made this, I had run out of corn syrup - which was really my main motivation for making it. I wanted pancakes that night, damn it. There is some minor crystallization, but not enough that I've felt the need to add corn syrup to later batches. The syrup keeps nicely in the fridge. And because it's pretty much just sugar and water, it's a dream to wash off of plates/cutlery.)
A maple-flavoured syrup may be obtained by using white sugar instead of brown in the same proportion. When the syrup has cooked to the proper stage, add maple flavouring a little at a time until the desired flavour is obtained. (Note: I am a corn syrup fan and only resort to maple syrup when I have no other choice, as such, I have not personally tried this variation. If anyone does, please let me know how it went for you.)
Alternate toppings:
- Get a small container of whipping cream (like, actual pouring cream) and whip it until stiff, mixing in some sugar if desired. It's gonna melt onto the hot pancakes fast, but it's oh so yummy.
- Berries in a light syrup. I actually wound up trying this one when desperately trying to find a use for the container of frozen raspberries and syrup that I'd picked up as an impulse buy.
- Jam or jelly. I tend to do this when trying to use up my grape jelly, or when I've made a fresh batch of freezer jam. The freezer jam works similar to berries in syrup, though I find the jelly tends to make the pancakes a bit slipperier, which is an adventure in adding jelly to each pancake on the stack, let me tell you.
- Icing sugar. If you're like me and butter each pancake as you add it to the plate (it's fun cooking for one. :D), sprinkling a bit of icing sugar on each pancake makes a neat effect, because it mixes with the melted butter and you get a light layer of butter icing on each pancake.
- Anything you can think of. ;)
Happy eats!
First up:
Pancakes!
The recipe I have, which I got from a cookbook my grandma wrote up and bound herself, is actually titled "Marta's Pancakes", sadly, I do not know if Marta was family, friend or someone who'd submitted the recipe to a newspaper or magazine.
Ingredients:
2 eggs
1/2 tablespoon of sugar (or a bit more if you like sweet.)
1/2 teaspoon of salt
2 cups of milk
1 cup of flour
Now, I have a preference for thicker, fluffier pancakes than this mixture of ingredients creates, so I tend to add:
2 teaspoons of baking powder
approximately 1 more cup of flour (I tend to eyeball it, scooping up some and letting it pour back into the bowl to judge the thickness.)
Now for the fun adjustments. This is great for when you're craving chocolate and don't have any in the house. Once your batter's mixed, add some cocoa powder to the mix. I find that once the batter is similar in look to chocolate milk, I've added enough. This makes for great chocolate pancakes. (Adding chocolate chips to this just adds to the fun.)
For things like blueberry or chocolate chip pancakes, there are two ways to pull this off. Dump your berry/chip of choice into the batter and mix, or wait until you've poured the batter into the skillet and sprinkle in the chips/berries then. Berry juice will spread more into the mixture if you add it before pouring, and everything will be better covered in the batter, but it's really a matter of your personal tastes here.
Mix. Pour. Cook. :D
Generally, I like to beat the eggs first, then mix in salt and sugar, then beat in the baking powder until it's nice and foamy, then milk and I add flour last, going until it's my desired thickness. I like making the batter smooth, though a lot of people encourage leaving the batter texture slightly lumpy. (The lumpy method works especially well if you make the batter the night before and leave it in the fridge for the morning, it lets the baking powder expand on its own for a bit and gives you beautifully fluffy pancakes. I'm generally making my pancakes with the intent to eat them as soon as possible, and am making them because I'm not in the mood for more complicated cooking that night.)
When cooking pancakes, watch the edges of the cake on the skillet. Once the bubbles stop closing over after bursting, this is a good time to flip them. I also find that the edges will solidify a bit.
Now, Toppings!
How to Make Your Own Syrup. :D
This is a Brown Sugar Syrup, which tastes similar to corn syrup. I'll include the alternates for a maple syrup at the end for those who prefer that taste.
Ingredients:
2 cups brown sugar, firmly packed
1 cup water
Dash of salt
1/4 cup light corn syrup (optional)
Combine sugar, water and salt into a saucepan/pot and heat to boiling. Cover and cook at a moderate rate for about 10 minutes or until a light syrup is formed. (Keeping it covered at this stage prevents crystallizing on the sides of the pan/pot, but be careful when removing the lid, I find that it tends to stick to the pot a bit.)
Cool and put into a covered jar. (I tend to use an old corn syrup squirt bottle that I've washed out and saved.)
If more syrup is made than is needed immediately, the corn syrup may be cooked along with the sugar and water; this will prevent crystallization during the storage period. Keep in tightly covered jar either in or our of the refrigerator. Makes about two cups.
(Ok, the first time I made this, I had run out of corn syrup - which was really my main motivation for making it. I wanted pancakes that night, damn it. There is some minor crystallization, but not enough that I've felt the need to add corn syrup to later batches. The syrup keeps nicely in the fridge. And because it's pretty much just sugar and water, it's a dream to wash off of plates/cutlery.)
A maple-flavoured syrup may be obtained by using white sugar instead of brown in the same proportion. When the syrup has cooked to the proper stage, add maple flavouring a little at a time until the desired flavour is obtained. (Note: I am a corn syrup fan and only resort to maple syrup when I have no other choice, as such, I have not personally tried this variation. If anyone does, please let me know how it went for you.)
Alternate toppings:
- Get a small container of whipping cream (like, actual pouring cream) and whip it until stiff, mixing in some sugar if desired. It's gonna melt onto the hot pancakes fast, but it's oh so yummy.
- Berries in a light syrup. I actually wound up trying this one when desperately trying to find a use for the container of frozen raspberries and syrup that I'd picked up as an impulse buy.
- Jam or jelly. I tend to do this when trying to use up my grape jelly, or when I've made a fresh batch of freezer jam. The freezer jam works similar to berries in syrup, though I find the jelly tends to make the pancakes a bit slipperier, which is an adventure in adding jelly to each pancake on the stack, let me tell you.
- Icing sugar. If you're like me and butter each pancake as you add it to the plate (it's fun cooking for one. :D), sprinkling a bit of icing sugar on each pancake makes a neat effect, because it mixes with the melted butter and you get a light layer of butter icing on each pancake.
- Anything you can think of. ;)
Happy eats!
