Yesterday was Fat Tuesday, so naturally we dove into a pancake dinner. Good times. We aren’t much for plain pancakes around here — I’m all about the chocolate chip, my wife’s into the banana and/or chocolate chip variety.
Naturally we are right-thinking people and build this around Alton Brown’s Buttermilk Pancake recipe, found over yonder at the Food TV site. I grew up on the Bisquick variety, so the conversion to this one is extra-welcome, and definitely worth the very minor extra steps (composing your own mix, acquiring buttermilk, separating the eggs).
Some notes:
- Served ‘em up with sausage links. We already do bacon in the oven, and recently converted over to doing sausage in the oven as well. It’s very effective and, with a little foil used, cleans up right quick. Highly recommended.
- Vermont Grade B Maple Syrup. Accept no substitutes. It’s like the bold complex red wine of syrups. We serve ours in one of those plastic “ketchup bottle” dispensers — every kitchen should have, like, twelve of those things, because there’s all sorts of stuff that’s not ketchup or mustard that works really well with them.
- My wife mixes the chocolate chips into the batter. While there’s a risk that they’ll sink to the bottom, this means the chips are coated with the batter and less likely to burn onto your griddle.
- Use actual buttermilk. I hear folks get “just fine” results using milk and lemon juice as a substitute (the juice provides the acid that the buttermilk normally does, key for activating the ingredients in the mix), but it can cause the pancakes to turn out a bit thinner than you might want.
And some pictures.
5 Comments
Oh that looks magnificent.
As an aside, one pancake trick I’ve learned is whipping the egg whites very nearly, but not quite, to a meringue-like consistency before mixing with the other ingredients. Lets you use interesting mixes of whole grain flours while keeping the cakes light and fluffy.
I’m in love with Fruit pancakes: 1:1 ratio of milk to self rising flour to 1 egg per cup of milk. Grate an apple, pear, or other fruit into the batter.
*mops up puddles of drool on laptop* Those look magnificent.
Out of curiosity, have you tried coating the chocolate chips in flour before adding them to the mix? I saw that tip on FN a while back (maybe even on Good Eats) for preventing them from sinking to the bottom of muffins. The principle should hold for pancakes.
And, is it really that hard to get buttermilk that you’d resort to lemon juice? Or am I just spoiled from living all my life south of Maryland?
I always loved Pancake Day as a kid but can’t be bothered making them just for myself.
Those look yummy. Bit like what we used to call Scotch pancakes, made on a griddle, while proper/ordinary pancakes were bigger and thinner and made in a pan.
Better shut up before I start gnawing my keyboard!