Sunday, December 2, 2012

Pancakes!

I love pancakes. If you find yourself in Connecticut, I will take you to Chip's Family Restaurant, which has the best pancakes I've ever had. Light, fluffy and if you like, in a metric ton of different flavors. And yes, Nashvillians, they're loads better than Pancake Pantry.

I've never actually made pancakes from scratch. I grew up on Bisquick, which always tasted just fine to me, until I went to Chip's.

And since I'm taking it easy, I'm using a pre-made mix. Specifically Arrowhead Mills buckwheat pancake mix. I first came across buckwheat in crepes around 1992. I spent much of my spare time at the theatre in Park City, Utah (there were some fabulous people in that organization, but we've since fell out of touch). Up the street was the Cafe des Artistes, which did savory buckwheat crepes. Yum. Nice depth of flavor and a nuttiness that I really enjoy. The cafe closed down before I left, sad to say, but it was a fun place and I think fondly of Val, who used to regularly wear a shirt that said, "Bite me."

Basically, for today's brunch (for two), I added 8 ounces of apple pie filling to my pancake mix and whisked it in just enough to make sure everything was well-blended. If you mix it too much, you get chewy pancakes due to an increase in gluten.

I figure you can probably use applesauce, which will give you a more even flavor and texture, but I think the pie filling added some nice texture to it. I enjoyed with a bit of butter. I have had apple pancakes with sour cream, but that never quite worked for me. 

There are two very good reasons why I don't have pictures today. One is, we ate the pancakes too quickly. The other is, well, I kind of suck at making pancakes. I can't seem to keep the pan at an even temperature, whether I let it cool or turn the heat down. Add to it that my stove is at a bit of an angle and well . . .they were tasty, but they were not pretty.

My next batch of pancakes will be a bit more involved. There will be bacon, for example, and probably chocolate chips. I got this idea from the nice people at Vosges, who make a bacon-chocolate bar. As Peter Sagall of Wait Wait, Don't Tell Me, fame said when he tried it, "I can now die happy. And sooner."

Happy weekend, everyone!

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