Saturday Morning Pancakes

As a kid, there is nothing like waking up on Saturday morning and coming into the kitchen to a stack of pancakes waiting for you. As an adult and a parent, delivering on that magic is of the highest priority. It’s also damn tricky when sleep is also so delicious. So, the goal was to find a recipe to help cross the bridge between cooking all morning and magical pancake mornings.

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Edited: This recipe was edited from the original to reduce the baking soda and add an acidic activator, aka buttermilk. I also changed brown sugar and melted butter to white sugar and vegetable oil to improve mixing and preparation time.

So, the first goal of these pancakes is they are delicious, obviously. The second goal is to be able to whip them together without much effort. Literally, smash everything into a bowl and be finished at the same time as the griddle gets hot. We tested it recently and it actually went a bit faster, and I got to set the table as I waiting for the hot griddle. Either way, I think it’s mission accomplished.

There is no special equipment needed for making these excellent pancakes. Any fully stocked kitchen should be able to whip these up just fine. However, the slow step in this recipe is the cooking of the pancakes. You could heat multiple pans and get them going that way, or fire up a hot plate. We are lucky to have an oven with a griddle built-in, so I can cook 3 pancakes at a time.

Making the Pancakes

Making my Saturday Morning Pancakes is mind-blowingly easy. First things first, turn on whichever cooking surface you are using to cook the pancakes so it’s hot when you finish mixing the ingredients. Combine the flour, brown sugar, baking soda, and sea salt in a large mixing bowl. Give it a quick stir before adding your wet ingredients.

Melt your butter in the microwave while you add the rest of the wet ingredients. This is foolproof, just don’t miss the bowl. The only mistake you could possibly make is pouring the hot butter directly on the eggs and cooking them. If you’re worried about that, add the eggs last or use vegetable oil.

Why Do You Add Orange Zest to Pancakes?

The citrus zest is one of the ingredients you could skip, but here is why I added it. After reading and watching Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat, and hearing how these elements combine to make things tasty, I tried the citrus zest. The zest gives a nice clean flavor that cuts through the usual butter/syrup/pancake flavors. I usually just zest the citrus right into the bowl and don’t measure it. Lemon zest adds a clean, bright flavor to the pancakes without being overwhelming. If you use orange zest, it adds a nice marmalade note to the pancakes, making them tasty in a completely different way. Either way, I zest about half of a reasonably sized citrus fruit straight into the bowl.

Mixing the pancakes is as easy as it gets. I fold it together first with a spatula to avoid the poof of sticking a hand mixer right into dry flour. Like a baking mushroom cloud. I mix with a hand mixer on low after the ingredients are folder together and reasonably mixed. It takes almost no time. As usual, mild lumps are okay.

Fire up the Griddle

Cooking the pancakes in really really simple. I used 1/4 cup to measure out the batter, and just ladled it onto the hot griddle, which I buttered once at the beginning. Cook pancakes on one side until the bubbles pop and solidify slightly, then flip. Cook on the other side until golden brown, rinse and repeat.

Bonus Tip: IF you have an over-the-range microwave, stack your cooked pancakes on a plate in there until all the pancakes are cooked. The stack of pancakes will keep itself warm as you add more hotcakes on top. AND the heat from the range will rise and heat the microwave, keeping the pancakes warm.

And that’s it. If you end up making these pancakes, please leave a note if you loved it or hated it, modified it, etc. I love to hear what everyone thinks and if they came up with a tastier version.