Basic Pancakes

Pancakes are our family's favorite Saturday morning breakfast. They can be changed up and topped with an infinite variety of flavors to mix things up.

But first things first. The basic recipe. The one almost every other one is built from.

Ingredients:

• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 1 Tbsp sugar
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1 egg
• 1 cup milk
• 2 Tbsp butter, melted and cooled

Directions:

1. Heat a griddle or skillet. For an electric griddle, follow the instructions. I set mine to 325, or a skillet to medium heat. 
2. In a large mixing bowl, combine all of the dry ingredients with a whisk and set aside.
3. In a second bowl, whisk all of the wet ingredients together, making sure to disperse the egg. The liquid should be pale yellow
4. Add the liquid to the dry ingredients and stir with  a spatula until the batter just comes together. There will be lumps, but they shouldn't be huge. 
5. Pour batter onto your hot griddle/pan and cook until the top side looks almost dry. Then flip with a spatula and cook until the other side is a light golden brown.

Makes:
About 8 4-6" pancakes.  This recipe doubles (or triples!) easily.

Notes:

A nonstick skillet is not necessary. I made pancakes for years with a 10" stainless steel frying pan. The trick is to make sure your pan is hot before adding the batter, or the pancake will stick. Cooking spray is not entirely necessary either, assuming that pan is hot. For a non-stick pan that has seen better days, you might want the spray.  To test to see if the pan is hot enough, flick a few drops of plain water on the surface. They should sizzle and evaporate almost instantly.

If you use a thin skillet, then be prepared to adjust the stove temperature the first time or two you make these. You can always turn up the heat a tad, or take the pan off the burner if its too hot.

Canola oil can be substituted for the butter, but the butter makes it richer :).

We drink skim milk almost exclusively in our house, but I've made these with 2% and whole also, with no adjustments to the recipe.

Put leftover pancakes into the freezer and pop them directly into the toaster for a quick mid-week breakfast (or dessert!)