Breakfast (or brunch, when eaten at lunch time) food is all in the rage now with plenty of new ventures sprouting all over. The mark up for simple breakfast food is quite unjustifiable to me, especially since it is not difficult to prepare yourself. I happened to have all the ingredients I need so I decided to have it for brunch today!

Hungry Bird’s Pancakes

(Makes 8 Pancakes of about 10 – 12cm in diameter)

Recipe adapted from Martha Stewart

Ingredients

• 1 cup all-purpose flour, (spooned and leveled)
• 2 tablespoons sugar
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup milk (choose a good tasting milk. HL is not milk so please don’t use that)
• 2 tablespoons canola oil (or butter melted, or any oil you like)
• 1 large egg
• 1 tablespoon canola oil (for greasing)

Directions

• Whisk together flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt and set aside.
• In a large enough bowl, whisk together milk, oil, and egg.
• Add dry ingredients to milk mixture and combine with a whisk until rather smooth. (do not overbeat)
• Heat a frying pan over medium low heat. Grease the pan with oil.
• Spoon batter and cook until surface of pancakes have some bubbles and a few have burst, 1 to 2 minutes. Flip carefully with a thin spatula, and cook until browned on the underside, 1 to 2 minutes more.
• Repeat until batter is used up.
• Serve immediately

Notes:

• Bubbles give the pancakes more character.
• For flavours, you can add chocolate covertures or blueberries immediately after spooning batter onto the frying pan.
• The heat has to be low. About 2 or 3 on the magic cooker is just right.
• I did not re-grease the pan because it was oily enough (the batter is oily).
• Top with whatever you like. I had Bonne Maman Raspberry conserve, Lurpax unsalted butter, fresh strawberries and organic raw honey.
• If the batter is too runny, add more flour. If it’s too thick, add more milk.

Updated 25/11/12

I made it again, but this time I had not enough milk so it was about half milk half water to make up the amount. I added a bit more baking powder (I use double acting, because that’s all I have at home) and I forgot to add sugar. I cooked it at an even lower heat. The results are thick, fluffy pancakes, with a slightly hardened surfaced, very different from the soft McDonald styled pancakes as of above. Tweak the recipe to your preference.