Hey Pot Heads!
This week we’re going to talk a little bit about pancakes. I might not be a huge fan of breakfast BUT I am a huge fan of pancakes and breakfast for dinner. They’re cheap, easy to make from scratch, and are a great gateway into the world of cooking. Mastering pancakes teaches you all the skills you need to make an endless variety of foods from fritters to muffins. Next week we’re doing a deep dive on chickpea flour and it’s many, many uses so this week I thought we should revisit pancakes to warm ourselves up.
Pancakes are a kind of batter bread and humans have been making them for thousands of years. No matter where we will lived and what kind of foods we had available, all humans across time and space have dreamed up pancakes.Travel around the world and you’ll see all kinds of batter breads like our leavened pancakes, crěpes, Ethiopia’s injera, Japan’s okonomiyaki, and Myanmar’s bein mont. The list could go on and on. Pancakes are as deep in our DNA as a fear of snakes.
All you really need for pancake success is a good skillet or similar flat bottomed, low-sided cooking pan. This could mean a well oiled cast iron or even the griddle that came with your stove. Luckily, pancakes are very forgiving. Did one stick or did you fuck up the flip? Cut up the rest of the pancake with your spatula right on the skillet and cook, flipping them all around, until all the pieces have some good color on them. Boom: scrambled pancakes. They kinda taste like funnel cake without all the oil and no one will even notice your mistake.
Below are some of my favorite pancake recipes I’ve dreamed up over the years from a shelf stable mix all the way to some strawberry rosé pancakes that are perfect for summer. Don’t know what to make? Pancakes. Nobody is ever mad about pancakes.
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