Two pancake recipes

I am not really into pancakes. But I recently came across two excellent recipes that have started to sway my opinion.


1: Julia Turshen's Sour Cream pancakes from her Small Victories cookbook, which I like because it has no added sugar, but are the fluffiest and most satisfying pancakes I think I've ever eaten.

3/4 cup flour
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
2 eggs
1 cup soour cream
Unsalted butter for cooking

Combine all ingredients. Melt butter in pan. Pour batter in 1/4 cup increments into pan (my pan holds 3 pancakes at a time).

I prefer to serve these with fruit topping instead of maple syrup (though of course the syrup is great too). For the fruit I simmer either strawberries or blueberries on the stove with lemon juice and fresh ginger -- the ginger is a wonderful addition to the fruit sauce, if you have it -- and spoon over the warm pancakes.



2: Perfect Buttermilk Pancakes from the New York Times. I ended up making these because I needed to use up a pint of buttermilk I bought. I also used buckwheat flour instead of all-purpose because I wanted to use my stash up (unexpected healthy element here). We had run out of syrup but I sprinkled some chocolate chips in the batter as the pancakes cooked and they were a nice sweet compliment to the nutty buckwheat flour.

I followed the NYT recipe almost exactly. Except I used a mix of  1 1/2 cups buckwheat flour, 1/2 cup all-purpose flour; and then I used 2 cups of buttermilk instead of  the called for 2 1/2 cups. Results: excellent. Chocolate chips were a nice addition because I had no syrup and no appropriate fruit to make a sauce with!

Nutty Cherry Rhubarb Crisp

I am not a recipe developer at all. But I have been baking and cooking long enough to understand a little bit about what makes recipes work. So I am proud of myself about how well this recipe came out, that I cobbled together from a couple of recipes to make it my own. I had a bunch of cherries that I needed to use up, as well as rhubarb from the CSA. I started searching for rhubarb cherry recipes but didn't come across quite the right thing. This nutty crisp is what I came up with. It is the perfect mix, to me, of fruity/sweet/nutty, and it tastes really good warm or straight from the fridge.

For fruit:

2 1/2 cups cherries, pitted and halved
2 1/2 cups rhubarb, sliced
1 cup brown sugar
2 tablespoons plus 1 teaspoon cornstarch
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp cinnamon


For crispy lid:

1 cup spelt flour (another thing I had from CSA; could easily swap any flour you have)
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup shredded coconut
1 cup chopped pecans
1 stick butter, diced.


Preheat oven to 350.

Mix fruit filling items together; set aside.

For topping: combine items in bowl of electric mixer. With mixer on low, add diced butter until entire mixture is moist and crumbly.

Pour fruit into 9x13 pan; sprinkle topping over the fruit. Bake for 1 hour until fruit is bubbling and topping is golden brown.

satisfying afternoon snack

Fluffy marshmallows

Several years ago, I found this Smitten Kitchen recipe for marshmallows and I knew I had to try it. I had recently gotten a Kitchen Aid mixer and this was the perfect project to test it out with.  I successfully made a batch in my own tiny NYC kitchen - if I remember correctly, without a candy thermometer - which I am still amazed about. Anyway. I've only made these a few times because they are SO MESSY to make; I remembered that fact only after I made them a few weeks ago. But honestly? it was worth it. They are so delicious; so much springier and fluffier than store bought marshmallows and very adaptable, flavor-wise. This time, I used a few drops of green food coloring and peppermint extract in place of vanilla to make them minty. I like cutting them into larger-than-normal squares, creating a two-bite marshmallow.