1 Cup of Flour
3/4 tsp Salt
2 tbsp sugar
1 tsp baking powder
1.5 Cup Milk
1 Egg


Whisk all ingredients together in a mixing bowl, heat a skillet to medium heat, brush with oil, butter or your favourite grease, spoon enough batter on to the skillet that you get a good sized pancake. When the batter bubbles and the top looks like it's starting to cook, flip the sucker over (cool people toss it in the air... even cooler people catch it) and cook until brown.

Eat 'em while they're hot with yummy Canadian Maple Syrup and butter... or jam... etc.

Well, I got tired of ordinary pancakes, so after some experimentation I have come up with some modifications to the recipe on the box of just about any pancake mix.

When the box recipe calls for 2 cups of pancake mix and 1.5 cups of water, this is what I do:

I continue with the recipe on the box. In other words, I mix it all into dough, then make the pancakes. The result tastes much better than regular pancakes.

Pancakes make one's life complete. They make a good meal any time of day, and are delicious snacks as well. Myself, I make about three batches throughout the day, although I could do with more if I had the patience to wait for them. You know you like pancakes too much when you eat them even if the middle isn't cooked. At one point, I found myself craving pancake batter almost as much as the pancakes themselves. Am I addicted, or just pathetic? Probably both.

I highly recommend the Mrs. Butterworth's Buttermilk Complete. Just add water and you're set. A two pound box can be bought for about $1.79 at most grocery stores. However, after you try this brand, you will find it almost impossible to settle for anything else. Spread the word.

This is my recipe, using the internationally recognized SI system for units.

6 dl Milk
3 dl Flour
2 Eggs
5 ml Salt

Pour the flour into half of the milk. Mix until smooth. Add the rest of the milk. Add eggs and salt. Let it rest for a couple of minutes before cooking them.

Serve with cream and strawberry jam

Pancakes are perhaps the world's oldest type of bread. Pictures of pancakes have been found that are from the Neolithic Age. Some facts about pancakes (yes, some of them depend on a rather loose interpretation of 'pancake'):

  1. Mix all the dry ingredients in a bowl.
  2. Combine the liquid ingredients and beat well.
  3. Combine the two mixtures together.
  4. Pour 1/4 cup batter unto a lightly greased hot pan. Cook until set, about 1 minute. Turn over and cook the other side, also for about 1 minute,

This recipe makes about 8 six-inch pancakes.

Source for recipe: I can't believe it's History, Katy Keck Arnsteen and Donna Guthrie

First of all, throw away those silly boxes of Bisquick and Mrs. Butterworth pancake mix. These things are not pancakes. They aren’t even close. They are to pancakes as a 60-watt lightbulb is to a mountain sunrise with birdsong. They are soulless pretenders. You can make better pancakes with hardly any additional effort.

Second, do not go to IHOP. Ever. Going to an IHOP for breakfast is even worse than using a pancake mix. It’s like spending a Saturday night downloading ASCII porn when your wife is waiting in the bedroom, reading Delta of Venus and wearing a maid’s uniform with bunny ears 1. Seriously, it’s that bad. IHOP use a pancake mix that is basically the same as the mixes you buy in the supermarket, and you don’t even get the satisfaction of having made something yourself.

You can’t get the taste of a real pancake in a box. You can’t even get it at most restaurants these days. Sadly, even some of the better restaurants now use batter-in-a-box for their Sunday brunch pancakes. Their pancakes certainly look nice, it’s true. Usually they are enormous, perfectly circular, erotically golden and gorgeously fluffy things languishing in the company of fresh green grapes and a couple of melon cubes. But looks are all these babies have going for them. These imposters taste like nothing at all, soak up syrup like sponges and settle like lead weights into your stomach. The fruit is there to disguise the pancakes’ worthlessness.

Why put your palate through this tawdry sideshow act, when real, honest pancakes taste so stupefyingly good and take about fifteen minutes to prepare? Instead, gather up the following items and prepare to be dazzled:

  • WET INGREDIENTS
    • 3 Tsp butter, melted
    • 1 ½ cups milk
    • 2 large eggs
  • DRY INGREDIENTS
    • 1 ½ cups flour
    • 3 Tsp sugar
    • 1/2 tsp salt
    • 1 ½ tsp baking powder

This will make enough pancakes for two or three people.

NOTE - If you want to substitute margarine for the butter, or low-fat milks for the whole milk, go ahead. But keep in mind that these substitutions will change the consistency and flavour of the pancakes. Low-fat milks will make the pancakes thinner. Likewise, switching the milk with buttermilk will make a wonderfully rich and fluffy pancake, but if you do this you should also add a little bit of baking soda. Lastly, some people like to add a dash of vanilla. I don’t.


PREPARATION:

To start with, melt your butter. You can either do this in a small sauce pot on very low heat or microwave it in a glass mixing cup.

While your butter is melting, mix the eggs and milk in a small mixing bowl. Don’t beat them up, just whisk until smoothly mixed. Now mix your melted butter in. Again, do not overbeat.

In a separate, larger bowl, mix the dry ingredients together.

Pour the wet ingredients over the dry ones, mixing as you pour. It is vital that you do not stir this for too long. Only stir until the ingredients are mixed. Excessive stirring will activate the gluten in the flour and make your pancakes tough, unpancakelike, and rather nasty. If there are a few small lumps in the mix when you finish stirring, don’t worry. They will disappear.

If you want to add fruit to the batter, pour it in now. Pancakes taste great with some sliced strawberries or blueberries floating in them. If you are adding fruit, I would suggest using a buttermilk batter so the pancakes are thick enough to hold it.

Now turn your stove on to medium heat. You can make pancakes on a griddle or in a skillet. I prefer a cast-iron griddle, for no particular reason, but there are many people who find the act of flipping a pancake in the skillet the most enjoyable part of the whole affair. (If you want to flip it in a skillet, try using a sliding circular motion, almost like tossing a ball underhand - and practice alone before you try it in front of the family).

Now wait. The batter wants to sit for a few minutes, and the griddle will take time to heat up. To test when the temperature is just right, flick a couple of drops of water onto the griddle. You want the cooking surface to be hot enough to make drops of water dance on it for a second or two before evaporating. If they just sit there laughing at you, turn the heat up. If they are instantly vaporized, turn it down a touch and wait a few minutes. This is a good time to get the coffee started.

When the surface is hot enough, spray it or rub it with butter. Only a tiny bit. The pancakes already have butter in them and will not usually stick to the surface unless you are severely burning them.

Finally, take a ladle and pour your first pancake. This brave volunteer is a test subject to see if the griddle is hot enough, and if anything needs to be added to the batter. Depending on how it runs, you may need to add a little milk or flour to the rest of the mix.

Watch this first pancake closely to gauge the time needed for each one. After a few minutes, little bubbles will begin to form on the top. You want to wait until the whole top has bubbled and the bubbles are starting to form permanent holes in the top of the pancake, instead of disappearing. At this precise moment, the bottom of your pancake is golden brown. This is the time to flip it. The other side has no such convenient indicators for readiness, so you will have to lift an edge every once in a while to look underneath the pancake. Usually it takes roughly the same time as the first side.

Do not flip the pancake more than once! Repeat flipping will only toughen the pancake. If you flipped it too early, too bad.

If all is well, start pouring more pancakes and call the rest of your family 2 for breakfast. By the time they have pried their eyes open and rolled out of bed, you should have a whole stack of pancakes ready for them to eat. Set out some butter and syrup, or some jam (strawberry jam is especially nice on pancakes), pour them some coffee, and enjoy.

One final note - please, please do not insult your wonderful pancakes by pouring syrup substitutes on them. Do them, and yourself, a huge favour and go buy some real maple syrup. After all, you made these things from scratch with only natural ingredients - why would you want to adulterate them at this point?


1 - Those who find themselves unmoved by this image may substitute a husband reading My Secret Garden, with or without bunny-eared French Maid costume.

2 - Optional.

Are you tired of golden-brown blobs of tasteless fluff on your plate? Are regular pancakes just too damn sissy for you? Well I have the answer. From the Johnny Boy Institute of Manly Cooking for Manly Men comes the MANCAKE. Yeah, that's right. It's a pancake, but manlier. Don't actually call it a mancake, though, 'cause that's a dumb name.

This serves two people with no significant regard for their health and a burning desire to stretch their stomachs to superhuman proportions. Maybe three normal people. Sometimes, one of me.

You will need:

Equipment
A cast iron1 frying pan
2 mixing bowls
Something to flip with, of course
egg whisk

Dry Ingredients
1.5 cups of whole wheat flour
3 teaspoons of baking powder
3 tablespoons of sugar
Cinnamon

Wet Ingredients
1.5 cups of milk
1 large brown egg
~1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
~1 teaspoon vanilla extract
~2 teaspoons canola oil or similar oil

You can use white egg and white flour if you want, but brown egg and whole wheat flour is inestimably superior.

Mix the dry ingredients in one bowl and all of the egg, olive oil, vanilla & milk in the other. Get your pan heated up nice and hot now - this is the tricky bit, because best results are achieved in a very narrow temperature range. I don't actually know what that temperature is, but it should be in the higher end of medium.

Now take a deep breath, prepare yourself to defy the basic tenets of mundane pancakery, and pour the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients, while stirring quickly until no lumps remain. Once this is done, you are on the clock, bitch. Yeah, that's right. You now have some whisked up pancake goo, with DANGEROUS CHEMICAL REACTIONS happening inside. Don't fuck with it anymore, or you will disrupt the work of the baking powder. In about two minutes you will be ready to pour. Take the whisk out of the batter & put it away. Hell, you have time, go ahead and clean it too.

Okay, are you ready? Your batter is risen and your pan is hot. The fey energies of your unholy creation should be crackling melodramatically, causing clocks to run backwards, pets to speak in tongues and neighbourhood children to be born with freakish spatula-arms for years to come. John Williams may be conducting a symphony in your vicinity. Do not be concerned, for you are mighty.

Put some of the canola oil on the pan. It should be just enough to spread around the entire cooking surface without too much left over. If it smokes a lot, your pan is too hot. If it smokes a tiny little bit, you're probably in the right spot. Pour2 some batter in the pan. It will continue to spread after you stop pouring, and it should mostly fill the pan at that point. Yes, it's big. Get over it.

When bubbles appear on the surface, your pancake is golden-brown, so don't even think about flipping it then. Don't de-stick the pancake from the pan and peek underneath or I'll track you down and smite you with my special pancake spatula. Anyway, your pancake should be as close to burnt as you can stand. Very dark brown is what we're going for here. When those bubbles don't come up and pop so much and the edges are starting to look dry, your pancake is ready to flip. This varies with the thickness of the pancake, of course. The second side doesn't take nearly as long to cook.

Update: I forgot the most important part! You must completely re-oil the pan after each pancake. You don't want so much oil the the edges go crispy, but you do want lots.

Serve with butter and maple syrup. Keep in mind that regular pancakes will stick to your ribs. These will make you feel like you've swallowed napalm. Don't eat them too regularly or you will probably die.


1 This is important. I've tried it on girly teflon and stainless steel. Don't bother.
2 Maybe you could spoon it out, but that's crazy talk if you ask me.

These are entirely yummy and a comforting note to any weekend morning. They are called dreamcakes in my home, and hopefully they will be deemed the same in yours.

What You Need

What You'll Do

Place the sifter in the big bowl. With a fork, fluff the flour before you spoon it in to the cup. Flour has a tendency to compact over time. Lightly fluffing it incorporates air to the flour and makes it, well, fluffy. The result is that you are less likely to have brick-like baked goods.

Scoop the flour in to the cup, level it off and dump it in to the sifter. Follow the same procedure for the half cup of whole wheat flour.

Toss the three tablespoons (and perhaps a smidge more) of brown sugar on top of that. Add level teaspoons of the baking powder and salt.

Sift the contents. If there are small humans in your home, this is a good time to call them for some help. They love working the sifter. Indulge them the sifting duties. Hopefully your bowl is big enough to catch any errant ingredients flung by the impromptu dancing encouraged by the rhythm of the sifter. If not, once they're done, just push the escapees from the kitchen counter in to the bowl. It won't hurt anything.

Thank your assistant, and send them on their way.

Melt the butter. If you're doing it in a microwave, about a minute on a high setting works.

Add the milk. Resist the urge to add the eggs at this point or else you'll cook them. Swish the butter and milk around. Now add your egg(s).

Mix everything together with your favorite whisk until the three ingredients have relinquished their identity and succumbed to the greater good. Pour this on top of the dry stuff in the big bowl. Use a handy spatula to summon the last drops of goodness.

Gently combine the wet and the dry. Fold them together until the flour mixture is just barely wet. A couple of dry clumps are OK. Overmixing will result in a tough pancake. Breathe deeply, mix lightly.

Place the bowl in your fridge while you get out plates, syrup, butter, forks. Make a pot of good coffee. Heat up a griddle or several pans. Chilling the batter a little puffs it up a bit when it hits the hot surface. (I'm sure there is a scientific reason for this, but I'm ashamed I don't know it.) Plop the batter on with a serving spoon or ladle and cook for a few minutes on each side, until a harmonious golden brown.

Note: Because of the whole wheat, the pancakes will necessarily be a couple of shades darker than your common version. Do not be alarmed.

Serve with your choice of toppings and enjoy.

Extra Tidbits

  • Feel free to add blueberries, strawberries or bananas to the uncooked side of the pancake. It's always so satisfying to seal them in when you flip them. I wouldn't add them directly to the batter unless you want mush.
  • Separate the egg(s) before you add them to the milk and butter. Place only the yolks in to the mixture and continue as stated. Beat the white(s) until foamy and almost stiff. Once the wet and the dry are just barely combined, fold them in. Experience more volume and a delightfully compliant crust. Sure, it's a little extra work, but what better way to show your love.

Sweet, vegan, and perfect for when you don't have the ingredients to make anything else.

Ingredients:

Mix all ingredients in a pan. Feel free to guestimate amounts. Leave for a while (I have no idea why you're meant to do that with pancake recipes, but I do it anyway). Cook in a frying pan (probably with a little olive oil or whatever) until they start burning.

Burning them is optional. I do it because I'm not very good at making pancakes.

As long as you notice fairly soon after they start burning they always turn out fairly edible delicious.

I see that DejaMorgana and others recommend such things as baking soda and syrup, and eating pancakes for breakfast! A new boyfriend once tried to impress me with such "American pancakes" for breakfast. It was dreadful! (It wasn't because he'd made some mistake, this guy was a good cook, and yes, I would rather spend an evening creating ascii pr0n than eat that stuff again!) Clearly this node needs one more entry:


Yet Another Pancake Recipe

First you need to make some batter, and to get some decent proportions to the mix. The traditional recipe goes something like this:

  1. Mix some roughly-OK amount of the wet ingredients.
  2. Keep whisking and add flour until you get the right consistency.
  3. Fry.
  4. Eat.

However, there are some problems with this recipe. One problem is when you want to tell it to somebody over the Internet, it becomes hard to explain what the right consistency is, and most of you probably wouldn't understand what I meant if I compared the consistency to that of rose hip soup.

So, here are some more precise proportions to get you started:

  • 3 eggs
  • 6 dl milk
  • 1½ dl wheat flour
  • ½ tea spoon salt

Some more info

  • There's the heat problem. How hot should it be? Using an electric stove where the heat setting is graded on a scale from 1 to 12 I would set it to about 8 to start with.
  • I would put some butter (or margarine, or oil) into the frying pan, even if I was using one with teflon.
  • "The first one is for the cat." Count on the first pancake to be pale and boring. Make it small, then put some butter on it and give it to the cat.
  • A pancake made with this recipe is typically about 3 mm thick.
  • Pour the batter into the frying pan and fry until it looks "dry" (takes about 2-3 minutes). Then flip and fry the other side for a minute or two.
  • Waffles = pancakes, but prettier. (The batter is the same, and here too the first one is for the cat.)
  • Serve with some sweet jam, like strawberry, raspberry or blueberry, (not lingonberry). You can also add some whipped cream or vanilla ice-cream (but this is just for special occasions).
  • If it's a Thursday and you are eating a traditional Swedish Thursday lunch it is considered cheating to eat the pancakes without first eating the pea soup!
  • People in Norrland (the north of Sweden) don't fry their pancakes, they cook them in the oven. But, I'm not from Norrland, I just live here (and my minimalist "kitchen" doesn't have an oven), so I'll let somebody else fill in the details about how to do that.
  • Another pancake horror story: My mother is a bit of a health nut and when I was a kid she got a Brilliant Idea!!!1! She mixed some stinging nettles into pancake batter and made waffles. This actually didn't taste too bad, but when she noticed that I accepted this new dish she gradually increased the amount of nettles, until after a few weeks the result was dark green waffles that tasted terrible!


ushdfgakjasgh asked what a "dl" is. It is a deciliter (1/10 of a liter).

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