Food & Drinks

Recipes

AMERICAN PANCAKE

by Marion Pauw

Generally, I am doing well diet-wise, but there are also moments (quite a few actually) when all that quinoa-lactose-free-gluten-free-superfood nonsense completely gets on my nerves. At that moment, I just want to eat delicious carbohydrates, preferably those delightful empty carbohydrates (white flour! sugar!) that all the health gurus warn you about. My craving for unhealthy pancakes stems from a childhood trauma. At my elementary school, it was always a tradition that we ate pancakes on the last day before the summer vacation. All the mothers would bake and send a stack with their children. My mother was the only one who made those thick whole grain pancakes (not even from a mix, but from flour from the local macrobiotic mill that was quite a bike ride away). I can still see all the mean girls from Leeuwarden in the eighties (it was a battlefield, my childhood, why do you think I started writing thrillers?) looking in horror at those pancakes and asking, ‘Did your mother make those?’ You don't have to guess which pancakes always ended up in the trash by the end of the morning. By now, my mother would be hipper than hip, but yes, like all other misunderstood geniuses, she was ahead of her time.

“There are also moments when all that quinoa-lactose-free-gluten-free-superfood nonsense completely gets on my nerves…”

This recipe is for American pancakes. So not those thin crepes we are used to here, but those fluffy things that you eat in large stacks with liters of sweet syrup on top. You need to let the batter rise for the best result. Make them nice for breakfast after a night of partying. Jet, Simone, Rens, girls from The Green Happiness, that guy from De Voedselzandloper and Fajah: this recipe is especially for you.

For the batter you need:

  • 500 ml milk
  • 1 tablespoon vinegar
  • 500 g flour
  • 75 g sugar
  • 1 packet baking powder
  • 2 large organic eggs
  • 75 g butter
  • 1½ banana

For the banana syrup:

  • 1½ banana
  • 75 g butter
  • 125 g brown sugar
  • 75 ml water

Further: a non-stick pan, a bowl, and a small pot with a thick bottom

Put the milk and vinegar in a bowl. Let it sit while you prepare the banana syrup. For that, put the 75 grams of butter, the sugar, and the water in the pan, along with one and a half (sliced) bananas. Bring this to a boil over high heat and let it simmer for about 2 minutes until the syrup has turned a nice light brown. Then remove it from the heat and let it rest.

Now make the batter: put the flour with the 75 grams of sugar and the baking powder in a bowl. Stir in the milk-vinegar mixture, the eggs, and one and a half (mashed) bananas. Finally, melt 75 grams of butter and stir it into the batter.

Cook pancakes with a diameter of about 15 centimeters. Serve them warm with the banana syrup. Lick your fingers. Lick your plate. Have at least three more.