Eating In: Apple pancakes with maple butter

Maybe it's the local in me, but this rainy weather is making me secretly happy. Happy that the leaves are turning orange and red. Happy that it's almost time to carve pumpkins. And happy that my cook-all-day and make-the-house-smell-wonderful recipes get to come out of hiding.


It's also causing me crave pancakes day and night. Luckily I've been able to keep the actual eating of pancakes to just once a week, last week's being the really really good pumpkin ones at Geraldine's. And today, oh boy, homemade apple pancakes with maple butter.

Thanks goes to Jennifer Donovan's Brunch cookbook, which inspired me this morning. Take a look; the book is full of pretty photos and tasty morning recipes. I made a few personal tweaks. These were heaven.

Apple Pancakes with Maple Butter
Pancakes:
2 apples (Fuji or similar works well)
1 1/2 c self-rising flour**
1/2 c confectioners sugar
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp ground ginger (or the same amount of finely grated fresh ginger)
1 egg
1 c milk
1 tsp butter

Butter:
3 T butter
4 T maple syrup

Peel and grate the apples and set aside.


Mix flour, sugar and spices together. Whisk milk and egg together and add to dry ingredients, stirring until just combined. The mix in grated apple.


Preheat oven to 200F, and place a plate in the oven to warm.

Mix butter and syrup in a small oven-proof bowl or small saucepan. Place in warm oven to melt, stirring occasionally while making pancakes.

Heat nonstick skillet over medium-low and add butter to melt. Add 1/4 batter to pan and spread out batter as much as you can (this batter makes pretty thick pancakes, so this helps keep them from being really thick). Cook until the bottom is nicely browned, about 1 or 1 1/2 minutes. Flip pancakes and continue until second side is golden. Remove and place in a single layer on warmed plate in oven. Continue with all batter.


Serve pancakes warm from the oven with the maple butter and extra maple syrup.



We had our pancakes with hot coffee, a little chicken sausage and fresh cantaloupe on the side. Ruby seemed to like the spatula more than the pancakes.


Oh well, more for us big people. And bonus! It's been two hours since I made 'em and the house still smells like apple pie.

**You can make self-rising flour by adding 1 1/2 tsps baking powder and 1/2 tsp salt to each cup of all-purpose flour. For this recipe you'd need 2 1/4 tsps baking powder and 3/4 tsps salt for the 1 1/2 cups flour. Yeah, you could've figured that our yourself, but I thought I'd just do the math for you.


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