PANCAKES AND SUNDAY MORNINGS….

Is there a better combination? I think not.

Sunday is my favorite day of the week. There are so many good things about Sundays. Sleeping in late,  reading the Sunday paper with a good cup of Joe, Sunday morning jazz, and last but not least…fluffy lemon blueberry pancakes.

This recipe is adapted from a recent issue put out by Fine Cooking Magazine titled: “Breakfast”. The recipe in the specialty magazine is for buttermilk pancakes and I tweak it to make it my own by adding  few ingredients. Their specialty magazines are popular can be found on news stands and online at www.finecooking.com  Fine Cooking is one of my all time favorite cooking magazines if not my favorite.

I love the classic combination of lemon and blueberry and this is a great way to celebrate those flavors in a pancake. We are coming into blueberry season, so now is the time to enjoy ripe blueberries and  most importantly, enjoy your Sunday mornings!

Lemon Blueberry  Pancakes (adapted from Fine Cooking buttermilk pancake recipe) For plain pancakes just omit the lemon zest and blueberries. Note: if you have a large posse you can easily double this recipe  🙂 and also the pancakes freeze well for quick morning grab/nuke/eat in the car sans syrup because yes you are the best Mom!

Yield: about twelve 4-5 inch pancakes

Ingredients:

3 T unsalted butter; more for serving

9 oz (2 cups) all purpose flour

1/4 cup granulated sugar

2   1/2 tsp. baking powder

1/2 tsp. baking soda

1/2 tsp. kosher salt

2 cups buttermilk (room temp)   * [TIP: If you don’t have buttermilk; simply take 2 cups of milk and add 2 measured Tablespoons of either lemon juice or white vinegar to the milk and let it sit for 10 minutes and it will thicken slightly and “sour” just like buttermilk].

1 tsp. vanilla extract (Note: The magazine recipe does not call for vanilla; but I always add vanilla to my pancakes- I think they just taste better)

2 large eggs

zest from one large lemon

1  to 1 1/2 cups fresh blueberries, rinsed well and drained.  (Note: if it’s not blueberry season, by all means use frozen– rinse the berries and let them strain in a mesh strainer to remove as much water as possible.)

Vegetable oil, for the griddle/skillet

Pure maple syrup, for serving

blueberry preserves, for serving

Directions:

Heat the oven to 200 degrees. Melt the butter in a small bowl in the microwave and set aside to cool slightly.

In a large bowl, whisk the flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. In a medium bowl, whisk the buttermilk, eggs, lemon zest and vanilla. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients. Whisk gently until the dry ingredients are ALMOST incorporated; STOP before the batter is evenly moistened. Add the cooled melted butter and mix until the batter is evenly moistened (THERE WILL BE LUMPS.  Now, walk away. YES I know there are lumps, just back up and resist the overwhelming urge to beat out the lumps…I swear it will be okay. This is going to ensure fluffy pancakes  🙂 Let the batter rest for 10 minutes.  Resting the batter also helps any gluten that has formed a chance to relax which also gives a more fluffy and tender pancake.  😉

Heat a griddle or a large skillet over medium heat until a few drops of water briefly dance on the surface before evaporating. Lightly oil the pan/griddle. Working in batches, pour about 1/3 cup of the batter onto the pan/griddle for each pancake, now drop as many blueberries as you like onto the pancake immediately after pouring the pancake, poke them down in slightly with your finger. I like to do one pancake at a time in a skillet, but if you have a large griddle you can do more than one; simply leave about an inch in between pancakes. When you see bubbles rise to the surface and the edges look dry carefully flip them over and cook until the cake is nicely browned about a minute more. TIP: You can find “pancake” spatulas at places like bed bath and beyond; they are round shaped large spatulas. So cool as it makes flipping fun and less stress. Okay a word about pancaking:  There is something weird about making pancakes; I swear the FIRST PANCAKE IS ALWAYS BAD. It’s either too dark, not dark enough etc.  Just chalk it up to pancake karma and  know that you usually have to sacrifice the first pancake to the PANCAKE GODS. I know, you figured this out too, huh?

*TIP: If your family is not standing over your shoulder grabbing pancakes 🙂  I like to hold the pancakes in a warm oven at 200 degrees while I finish the rest. I take a cake pan and line it with a large piece of tinfoil that is big enough to hang over the sides of the cake pan, and after each pancake I take off the skillet, I reach in the oven carefully and plop it in the pan and loosely cover the cakes with the tinfoil while I commence pancaking.

Serve with hot butter and maple syrup.  Or if you want to try my version; I like to take a dollop of blueberry preserves and fold up the pancake like a taco and eat it this way.

Printable recipe:

https://docs.google.com/document/d/108eaSST4wTv9j1BCtc8mtsVI_rj6qMiIDoXgScWbqrM/edit?hl=en_US&authkey=CO_Rr_4M

Happy pancaking!

Suzie