If only every day was a lazy Sunday: Banana Bread Pancakes

I am a sucker for lazy Sunday food. I have an assortment of breakfast food pans in the pantry for just this reason. I like to make anything from ebelskivers to mini-waffles but sometimes all it takes is a new twist on a classic to get me inspired.

I am also a sucker for Pinterest. I was a fan of Pinterest before I got engaged, using it to search for new recipes, party decoration ideas, and home decor. Of course now I am elbow deep in wedding ideas (how is a girl supposed to make a decision on wedding decor when every day there is a new batch of ideas?!?) but I still take some time to look at the food.

It is the perfect storm when two of my sweet spots (no pun intended) come together and provide a gem like How Sweet It Is' Banana Bread Pancakes http://www.howsweeteats.com/2011/06/whole-wheat-brown-sugar-banana-bread-pancakes/.

Words cannot describe how wonderful these pancakes are... I mean, banana bread + pancakes + maple glaze = lazy Sunday food coma, in the best way possible of course. I made these for the first time, solely based on how yummy they looked on Pinterest. They went wildly above and beyond my expectations and I immediately sent a text to one of my vegan friends in Toronto who is a fellow foodie. She "veganized" them and had the same glowing reviews as I did. Within seconds, these to-die-for pancakes became Sunday staples in both our homes.

So this weekend, brew up some coffee, make a batch of these bad boys, then snuggle into the couch with some blankets and a movie while the banana bread pancake food coma sets in!

Banana Bread Pancakes
makes 12 pancakes
2 cups all purpose flour (or whole wheat pastry flour to be somewhat healthier or add 2 Tbsp of flax seed to the all purpose as I did)
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup brown sugar
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
2/3 cup milk
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
3 large ripe bananas, mashed
2 tablespoons butter, melted

In a large bowl, combine flour, baking powder, sugar, salt, cinnamon, and nutmeg in a large bowl. Measure out the milk and add the vanilla extract to it. Whisk together the dry ingredients and add in milk and vanilla, stirring to combine. The mixture will still be dry. Add in mashed bananas and mix. Add in melted butter and stir until batter is somewhat smooth.

Heat a skillet or grilled on medium heat. Using a 1/3 cup measure, spoon batter into rounds and cook until bubbles form on top – about 2-3 minutes. The pancakes will be thick but don't worry, they cook through.Flip and cook for a minute or two more. Repeat with remaining batter. Serve hot with butter and syrup, or the vanilla maple glaze.


Vanilla Maple Glaze
1/2 cup maple syrup
3/4 cup powdered sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Combine all ingredients in a bowl and stir until smooth. Pour over pancakes.

Thanks to Jessica and her How Sweet It Is blog for posting these on pintrest!!

We're Back!!

My first inclination is to apologize for our prolonged absence, but the Maine lobsterman in me says screw that. We have no reason to apologize. We will, however, happily share an explanation for why we’ve been absent. We think you’ll forgive us. On December 19, 2011 Dawn and I got engaged! I’ll let Dawn share some of the specifics of the engagement at a later point, but between our Christmas and New Year’s trip to California, my studying for the LSAT, and Dawn and I trying to get our wedding planning on course, we simply haven’t had much free time. The little time we have had has been dedicated to other ventures besides cooking. We’ve missed our contributions to Cats. Crooners. Cook. We’ve missed posting reading material for our friends and family members to read in the wee morning hours during baby feedings. We’ve missed the excitement of finding out someone from a new country has found our blog. But we’re back baby! We have a whole new pantry full of an assortment of new cooking tools acquired over Christmas, and we’re excited to break them all in. We look forward to a new year of tasty treats and fantastic food. Stay tuned, we’ll have a few new recipes posted shortly. 

Rose Fondue

Dawn and I wanted to be sure to post something for our triumphant return. We have managed to squeeze out enough time in the past 45 days to cook a few meals here and there. We’ve done our best to take photos of everything we felt was blog worthy. Some of the photos aren’t our best, but come on people, we’ve been busy!

As many of you may know by now, we like cheese. So it seems appropriate that we start 2012 off on a cheesy foot. Hopefully some of you out there have tried our champagne brie pesto fondue. If not, I urge you do so, and to give this lovely fondue a try. It’s still winter. It’s cold out, the wind is howling and when the weather is bad, it doesn’t get much better than to gather around a table with friends or family and dip some of your favorite foods into rich and flavorful melted cheese. Here’s the recipe.

-          4 ounces Gruyere cheese

-          8 ounces mild white cheddar or  swiss

-          8 ounces rose wine

-          1 garlic clove

-          3 teaspoons cornstarch

Directions:

Rub the inside of the fondue pot with the cut side of the garlic. Add the wine and heat to a heavy simmer. In a medium bowl, toss the cheese with the cornstarch. Stir into the fondue pot by small handfuls until cheese is melted.

As we highlighted in our Pesto, half of the fun with fondue is what you choose to dip. For this rendition we steamed some baby carrots & broccoli, sliced an apple, cooked some beef and vegetarian sausage and sliced some fresh bread. Enjoy!