Welsh Pancakes

Ladies & gents (by a show of hands how many gents are reading this???), we are thrilled to have Christy with us today. She is a friend we have acquired through this here project we have going and we are quite taken with her. She's like a good Neil Young tune - has a Heart of Gold and writes 2 delightful blogs. This one is her personal blog (I LOVE this post [which features one of our dear Mavis's creations]. How can you not want to curl up and drool -affectionately- all over someone who says "I have a magnet on my fridge that says 'My goal is do something outrageous every day"...and it's true...that is one of my goals, EVERY DAY!!!'"). And she also has a food blog. I made this salmon last night and it was fantastic. My kids even devoured it. Christy is going to be posting recipes and other delights regularly so let's welcome her. Thanks for being here Christy!

Hi - I'm Christy, and I am thrilled to be guest posting here on one of my all-time favorite blogs today!

Since summer is coming (here on the east coast -- I understand it may already be hot out there in Utah where I believe many of you readers might live) I thought I'd share one of our family's favorite summer-time desserts: Welsh pancakes.

We're a British-American family after all - my husband is Welsh, I'm American, and our lucky daughter has dual citizenship. Since we currently live on this side of the pond, we try to incorporate as many British'isms and British meals into our life as possible, so my husband doesn't get homesick - and because I'm a Welsh-Wannabe. We watch rugby, drink wine with our meals, and eschew Hershey's for Cadbury, thank you very much. But one of my favorite British traditions are these pancakes - which look and taste a whole lot like crepes.

I admit, it took me a while, but now when I hear pancake, I don't think of the kind of stack you see at IHOP. I think of what I call a crepe. Mmm...

These pancakes are traditionally a dessert after a big dinner. Brits love them. Over there, Shrove Tuesday is also known as Pancake Day. For a quick, concise history of this day, click here.

But seriously. Pancake Day...how cool is that? Can you imagine our country naming a holiday after a dessert? If we ever did that, I'd lobby hard for Cupcake Day. Man, that would be great.

But back to the pancakes.

We think Delia has the best recipe, and we've adapted hers found here. Here is how we make them at our house:

Ingredients
4 oz of plain flour (about half a cup - if you have a scale, use that instead of measuring it in cups)
pinch of salt
2 large eggs
7 oz milk mixed with 3 oz water (same deal with the measurement here - 7 oz is about 3/4 cups, 3 oz is less than half a cup)
a few pats of butter
lemon juice (fresh or the fake-lemon plastic variety)
powdered sugar
regular sugar

Instructions
Sift flour into large bowl. Make well in center of flour and crack two eggs into the well.
Begin whisking egg and flour together with a whisk, or a fork. Slowly add milk/water mixture, whisking in between pourings. Mixture will be lumpy at first, but they will eventually disappear.

Melt the butter in a non-stick frying pan, which you will use for making the pancakes. We use a medium-sized pan, about 12 inches.

Add 2 TBSPs melted butter to the batter mixture. Set the remainder aside for greasing pan between pancakes.

Heat pan on high heat for about a minute or two, until the pan is really hot. Add a little of the melted butter. Then pour in slightly less than a 1/3 cup of the mixture (more than a 1/4, but less than a third...) to the hot pan. Swirl the mixture around the pan (lifting pan off burner as you swirl) to completely cover the bottom of the pan with the mixture. Cook for about 30 seconds. At that point you should be able to jiggle the pan and the pancake should come loose from the pan. You can carefully lift up the edge of the pancake with a spatula to check and see if it's lightly gold/brown on the bottom. When it is, flip it, and cook the other side.

When it's done, gently slide it out of the pan onto a plate.

We like to eat them immediately - they're toasty warm and crispy around the edges this way. We suggest enjoying the pancakes three ways:

1. Spread a small amount of butter on them, sprinkle with a little lemon juice and sugar. Roll, and devour. Mmm.

2. If you want to add a little color to your plate, mix up some fresh fruit. We like grapes, strawberries and blackberries all mixed together, along with a bit of vanilla yogurt (if we were making these in Britain we would probably use Creme Fraise - but it's definitely more healthy to use yogurt). Roll up, sprinkle with confectioner's sugar and enjoy!

3. And for the most decadent dessert... my favorite...melt some semi-sweet chocolate chips in the microwave (stirring occasionally - takes a couple of minutes), spread on the pancake. Roll up, sprinkle with confectioner's sugar. Enjoy!

And here's what they look like when we're done. (I don't have a picture of the chocolate ones because we made these last night and we try to be healthy during the week!)

Yum!

I hope you try these out with your friends and family this summer. If you do, feel free to leave a comment here or on this recipe on my food blog, What We Eat . I'd love to hear from you!