Cooking
A couple of times on vacation Lee and I have gone out for Dutch pancakes. We like having them for breakfast, but it turns out in Holland the Dutch don't actually eat pancakes for breakfast. Needless to say, we've suffered through some very long mornings waiting for pancake shops to open up for lunch. Of course some Dutch pancake shops know what pancake freaks we Americans are and open early.
In Holland they eat an eggy crepe type pancake as big as a large dinner plate. Flat like pizzas, they come topped with almost anything you can imagine from tomatoes, cheese, bacon or shellfish to dessert varieties with chocolate or ice cream and fruit. Pancakes have a long tradition in the Dutch culture. Supposedly over 300 years ago the first pancake was created in Holland but only in recent times have they gone crazy with the toppings. Dutch pancake houses are not only popular in Holland but we've found them in Canada and in the UK. But I've never seen a puffed oven baked pancake in any of them, of the type that we call a Dutch Baby. So after doing some investigation, I'm pretty sure that a Dutch Baby is a "Pennsylvania Dutch" recipe of German origin and not really Dutch at all.
There are plenty of very good recipes for this type of baked puffed up pancake. I originally got the recipe from Sunset magazine but Anna Thomas's "The Vegetarian Epicure" has a good version as well called German Apple Pancakes. If you want to try something easy and impressive with ingredients you are more than likely to have on hand, a Dutch Baby, regardless of its heritage, is your ticket.
Note: The following recipe serves 2. You can make individual pancakes by cutting the recipe in 1/2, though don't put any less butter in the pan. (As you can see from the measurements, it is about the easiest recipe ever to multiply depending upon how many people you want to serve.)
Dutch Baby
Serves 2
Ingredients
1/2 cup milk
2 eggs
1/2 cup flour
1 Tablespoon butter
Instructions
Preheat the oven to 450-500 degrees for at least 15 minutes.
In a blender mix the milk and eggs, while blending, spoon in the flour. Put a cast iron skillet or a pie pan in the oven and when hot, add the butter. As soon as it is sizzling, swirl the butter around to make sure the pan is covered, then pour in the batter and bake for 10-15 minutes. It should puff up and then collapse when it comes out of the oven. You can bake this for more or less time depending on how eggy or crispy you like it.
Top with powdered sugar and a squeeze of lemon juice. Or fresh fruit and yogurt. Or slices of apple that you have sauteed in butter and sugar till tender.
Enjoy!
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Cooking
Dutch Baby:Recipe
A couple of times on vacation Lee and I have gone out for Dutch pancakes. We like having them for breakfast, but it turns out in Holland the Dutch don't actually eat pancakes for breakfast. Needless to say, we've suffered through some very long mornings waiting for pancake shops to open up for lunch. Of course some Dutch pancake shops know what pancake freaks we Americans are and open early.
In Holland they eat an eggy crepe type pancake as big as a large dinner plate. Flat like pizzas, they come topped with almost anything you can imagine from tomatoes, cheese, bacon or shellfish to dessert varieties with chocolate or ice cream and fruit. Pancakes have a long tradition in the Dutch culture. Supposedly over 300 years ago the first pancake was created in Holland but only in recent times have they gone crazy with the toppings. Dutch pancake houses are not only popular in Holland but we've found them in Canada and in the UK. But I've never seen a puffed oven baked pancake in any of them, of the type that we call a Dutch Baby. So after doing some investigation, I'm pretty sure that a Dutch Baby is a "Pennsylvania Dutch" recipe of German origin and not really Dutch at all.
There are plenty of very good recipes for this type of baked puffed up pancake. I originally got the recipe from Sunset magazine but Anna Thomas's "The Vegetarian Epicure" has a good version as well called German Apple Pancakes. If you want to try something easy and impressive with ingredients you are more than likely to have on hand, a Dutch Baby, regardless of its heritage, is your ticket.
Note: The following recipe serves 2. You can make individual pancakes by cutting the recipe in 1/2, though don't put any less butter in the pan. (As you can see from the measurements, it is about the easiest recipe ever to multiply depending upon how many people you want to serve.)
Dutch Baby
Serves 2
Ingredients
1/2 cup milk
2 eggs
1/2 cup flour
1 Tablespoon butter
Instructions
Preheat the oven to 450-500 degrees for at least 15 minutes.
In a blender mix the milk and eggs, while blending, spoon in the flour. Put a cast iron skillet or a pie pan in the oven and when hot, add the butter. As soon as it is sizzling, swirl the butter around to make sure the pan is covered, then pour in the batter and bake for 10-15 minutes. It should puff up and then collapse when it comes out of the oven. You can bake this for more or less time depending on how eggy or crispy you like it.
Top with powdered sugar and a squeeze of lemon juice. Or fresh fruit and yogurt. Or slices of apple that you have sauteed in butter and sugar till tender.
Enjoy!
- The Lucky Pig Recipe
I am somewhat obsessed with a dish called the Lucky Pig, it’s served at Solbar in Calistoga and I order it almost every time I dine there. It’s basically tender roast pork served with a lot of other goodies—sesame pancakes, peanuts, jalapeños,...
- Lemon Cottage Cheese Pancakes: Recipe
When I was growing up we always had cookies in the house. Some of my favorites were almond windmills, raisin biscuits and lemon coolers. Lemon coolers were really yummy lemon cookies with powdered sugar and they came in a bright green and yellow box....
- Quicheless Leek Lorraine Recipe
For a time, quiche was the quintessential lunch dish, and then it wasn't. It was all because of one silly book: Real Men Don't East Quiche which was published in 1982. Quiche? Girly? Suddenly no one wanted to to be seen eating quiche. Quiche...
- Double Blue Pancakes Recipe
Summertime is when all sorts of berries appear. Strawberries first, then raspberries and blueberries and eventually blackberries. Right now you can buy big baskets of blueberries for only a couple of dollars. They are sweet and turn your tongue blue...
- Perfect Potato Pancakes
It's not like I haven't made potato pancakes in the past. And I most certainly grew up with them; it was quite common to see advertisements in the daily newspaper for potato pancake sales, benefiting some organization or another. But of all the...