Jellybean Pancakes

When I first announced my intent to make jellybean pancakes, I was widely ridiculed. But these pancakes came out amazing, so I guess I proved everyone wrong!

I love jellybeans. I always forget about them until around Easter, then I eat so many I feel sick.
I used Starburst jellybeans. My original intent was to crush them up a lot then add them to the batter almost like sprinkles. But turns out Starburst jellybeans are pretty much indestructible. I smashed them with a lot of heavy objects, but only managed to crush a few. So I ended up adding them pretty much whole.

I was a little worried the jellybeans would stick to the pan. Although they did melt a little, the melted sugar came right off.

The recipe I used promised super fluffy pancakes, which is what I wanted so that the jellybeans wouldn't stick out too much. And boy, they were fluffy. I cut the amount of recommended sugar in half since I figured the jellybeans were sweet enough.
They did stick together once I stacked them, but were so delicious.

The pancakes themselves were fluffy and light, and the jellybeans added a burst of flavor and chewiness. They almost force you to eat slower because you have to chew more, which heightens your appreciation of the flavors.

Maybe I should leave some of these out for the Easter bunny...

Jellybean Pancakes Makes 5 small thick pancakes  1 cup all-purpose flour 1.5 teaspoons baking powder 1/4 teaspoon salt 1/8 cup sugar 1/2 cup milk 2 tablespoons melted butter 1 egg 3/4 cup jellybeans, slightly smashed Mix dry ingredients in a large bowl In a separate bowl, mix egg, milk, and butter then pour into dry mixture Add jellybeans and stir Cook on a hot buttered frying pan - about 1/3 cup batter per pancake (batter will be very thick!) I would recommend soaking your dishes right away after you are done cooking to get rid of any stickiness!

Double Chocolate Pancakes

Chocolate pancakes with chocolate chips, and less than 10 ingredients! Where could you go wrong? A few places, it turns out, but the result was still delicious. 

I had a lot of help with these ones. Friends to wash dishes, mix batter, and entertain me with amusing stories! It was nighttime though, and I was distracted, so the photos didn't come out too great. 

We were hungry, so we set up two pans to cook on. Next time I'll try and use our big griddle, which I am a little afraid of. 

While we were cooking the first few pancakes, we kept hearing this odd beeping noise. Turns out it was the microwave. Surprise, I left the melted butter in there! We poured about 2/3 of it into the remaining batter and poured the rest over some potatoes I was roasting in the oven.

Surprisingly, it was hard to tell the non-butter pancakes apart from the butter ones. They were maybe a little grainer and slightly more bitter.
They also came out this kind of gross grey color, not at all like the ones in the picture I looked at. How did she get hers to be so brown? I think she may have used Dutch-process cocoa powder.

We ate them with vanilla ice cream and strawberry preserves that Natalie made. But they would have been good just plain too!

Double Chocolate Pancakes Adapted from Becky Bakes Makes about 10 pancakes 2 eggs 1 1/4 cup (almond) milk 3 tablespoons melted butter (optional, evidently!) 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour 1/4 cup cocoa powder (use the darker Dutch-processed kind if you have it) 2 teaspoons baking powder 3 tablespoons sugar 1 cup chocolate chips Put all the ingredients in a big bowl and mix around. Try not to forget anything.  Cook on a hot buttered pan.  Feed to your friends for dinner!

Flapjacks + Flapjacks

I made these flapjacks a while ago, and they turned out really good. Last time I made them with cornmeal, but I wanted to use up some of the giant bag of grits I bought, so I substituted. 

I cooked the grits for a few minutes first to soften them up, something that you wouldn't need to do if you used cornmeal. 

They came out thicker than last time, and had a slightly chewy texture. I think that came from the grits, and also because I didn't use as much water as last time. It was good though! I ate them with maple syrup (for lunch of course). They are super easy to make too, with just a few ingredients, and totally vegan. 

While I was searching Pinterest for flapjacks, a common pastime of mine, I kept seeing pictures of chewy granola cookie bars. Evidently this is some English dessert made with oats and a whole lot of sugar and butter. I figured it would only be right to make both kind of flapjacks, purely for research purposes. 

I looked at a few recipes, then combined them and made a bunch of substitutions based on what I had in the cupboard. 

I think I used a bit too much oil because it was all bubbling when I took it out of the oven. Next time I'll add more oats to compensate. 

It sure looked fine once it cooled though!

I got a new app on my phone that I'm using to edit pictures. I may have gone a little overboard with the color saturation on this one.

Thirty seconds after taking this picture I ate everything on this plate then hid the rest from myself, out of sight.
I'm going to see some friends tonight and I plan on bringing them each some flapjacks - both British and American style!

Flapjacks Makes 6 large pancakes  2 cups all-purpose flour 1/2 teaspoon salt 2 teaspoons baking powder 1/2 cup grits  2 cups water Boil 1 cup of water in small pot. Add grits to boiling water and cook for 2 minutes * Combine flour, salt, and baking powder then stir in cooked grits Add remaining cup of water and stir (for a thinner flapjack, add more water) Cook over medium heat (I used about 1/3 cup of batter per pancake) Serve with maple syrup * If using cornmeal in place of grits, omit this step and just use 1/2 cup dry cornmeal

Flapjack cookies Makes 1 dozen  1/2 cup coconut oil 1/2 cup margarine, melted 1/2 cup simple syrup (made by melting 1/3 cup white sugar in 1/3 cup boiling water) 1/4 cup white sugar 1/4 cup brown sugar 1/2 tsp vanilla 3 cups oats Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line a baking dish with parchment paper (a pie plate is just the right size) Mix all ingredients except oats and stir until smooth Add in oats Bake for 30-35 minutes (Exact cooking time will depend on how long you forget they are in the oven because you are looking at pictures of cats on the internet)

Peppermint Chocolate Chip Pancakes

Happy St. Patrick's Day! I decided to celebrate with green pancakes. I have a surplus of green food dye from last St. Patrick's Day, for some reason...

I made the pancakes at Ellen's apartment, but I had to go to work first, so I mixed all the dry ingredients in the morning and put them in a plastic bag. I also threw the dye and the extracts in my bag. I think some leaked, because today I ate an apple that was also in my backpack and it tasted strangely minty. 

The recipe I based this off was for mint chocolate chip pancakes, but I didn't have mint extract. They were all sold out at the store too! So I just stole some of Natalie's peppermint, leftover from Christmas baking. 

I was kind of tired after work, so I just threw all the wet ingredients on top of the dry and mashed them around with a spoon. 

I substituted plain yogurt for buttermilk (partially because buttermilk was too hard to find in the store, partially because whenever I buy it I never use the whole thing). But then the batter was too thick, so we poured in some milk until it was the right consistency. 

Green soup! 

They were nice and fluffy.

And they smelled just like mint chocolate chip ice cream!

We ate them for dinner with vanilla ice cream.

The peppermint flavor was very strong, but not in a bad way. Although highly reminiscent of shots of peppermint schnapps with chocolate syrup.

Peppermint Chocolate Chip Pancakes Adapted from Epicurious  Makes 9-10 medium pancakes  1 1/3 cup all-purpose flour 1 tablespoon sugar 1 teaspoon baking powder 1/2 teaspoon baking soda 1/2 teaspoon salt 1 cup plain yogurt 1/2 cup milk 1 egg 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract 1/2 teaspoon peppermint extract 4 drops green food dye 1 cup chocolate chips Mix dry ingredients in a large bowl Add in wet ingredients and stir Stir in chocolate chips Cook over medium heat (I used about 1/2 cup of batter per pancake) Serve with vanilla ice cream :)