Background
Despite growing up in a resolutely Jewish household where my mother shunned any acknowledgement or celebration of non-Jewish festivals - no stockings or advent calendars and certainly no Easter eggs - Shrove Tuesday was always embraced with abandon. My dad - who as a self-taught property developer-come architect, was a dab hand when it came to anything requiring technicality and precision - used to whip up stacks of perfectly round, paper-thin crepes, to be liberally doused in fresh lemon juice and fine drizzle of golden syrup. As delicious as these delicate delights were, they always got me yearning for the pancakes of my early childhood American summer holidays. My auntie Susie and Uncle Malcolm lived in Toronto which meant we invariably tacked on a trip to both Florida (Long Boat Key to be exact) and New York. This in turn meant big, doughy pretzels from street vendors, bucket-sized peanut butter frozen yogurt and most importantly - diner breakfasts: stacks of light, fluffy, saucer-sized blueberry pancakes doused in real maple syrup with extra berries to boot. And so it is these pillow-like piles of childhood pancake joy that I have strived to recreate, sans gluten. I have experimented with various additions both in flavour and texture: adding cornmeal for a more wholesome texture, butter for richness, milk vs buttermilk. I have settled on a buttermilk rich, butter-less incarnation, with normal gluten free flour (Doves Farm is my staple) and I use only the white of the eggs as I have found this gives the ultimate in lightness. It also prevents them being overly-eggy or tough. Thanks to American's Test Kitchen, I have found that the addition of bicarbonate of soda aids in creating that cloud-esque lightness as is reacts with the acid in the buttermilk to produce bubbles of carbon dioxide. Vis a vis cooking - you don't want to use solely butter or oil but a bit of both as the oil will stop your batter sticking whilst the butter will give your pancakes a hint of crispness. Finally, (and I can see the look of disgust on my mother's face as my fingers hover over the keys to type this), I like to accompany my stack with some crispy grilled bacon from my amazing Bermondsey butchers Bell & Sons. The best way - in my humble Glutenless Glutton opinion - to supercharge your Shrove Tuesday stack.
Ingredients
- 350 ml buttermilk
- 2 egg whites
- 20 grams butter (for greasing the pan)
- A little oil - rapseed or other flavourless oil with a high burning point oil
- 10 ml vanilla extract
- 125 grams plain Doves Farm flour
- 3 Tsp bicarbonate of soda
- 2 Tsp baking powder
- 1 Tsp grams salt
- 100g Blueberries
Instructions
- Put the oven on low to keep the pancakes warm, and cook or otherwise prepare any bacon or other accompaniments. Wash your blueberries and then pat them dry with kitchen towel. This is important if you don't want them to bleed juice into your pancake whilst it cooks.Crisp bacon under the grill on both side. Keep plates warm in oven.
- Put the flour, salt, baking powder and bicarbonate of soda into a mixing bowl. Whisk the egg whites with the vanilla extract until they form soft peaks.
- Whisk the buttermilk into the dry ingredients until you have a smooth paste and then stir in the egg white mixture. Don't over mix as you don't want the mixture to overwork the protein in the egg white and lose the fluffiness. Fold in the blueberries if using.
- Put a heavy-based frying pan on a medium heat and wipe the base with a knob of butter and a brush of rapeseed oil.
- Use a large spoon or small ladle to dollop pancakes into the pan (you'll probably need to do this in at least 2 batches) and cook until they begin to look dry and bubbly on top: depending on the heat of your pan, this should take about 3 minutes.The key is to let them cook slowly.
- Flip over and cook the other side and cook for another couple of minutes until golden. Put into the oven to keep warm while you cook the remaining pancakes - there's nothing worse than a tepid stack of pancakes to spoil your breakfast/brunch.
- Serve with large splashes of maple syrup and bacon (or other more kosher toppings if you're a better Jewish daughter than me).
