Dutch Pancakes with Apples (Pannakoeken)

I never really liked the pancakes served at numerous diners. The were light, fluffy, soft and pretty much needed to be soaked with syrup to taste like anything. Then i tried these dutch pancakes and decided that if am going to have pancakes then i am going to have these ones. These pancakes are not light and fluffy but are very custardy and dense, they are not thick and soft but are infact thin and crispy on the edges. The apples make are a good fruity addition and cinnamon just goes great with the apples.

Ingredients

(Makes 1 large pancake)
Half cup milk
1 egg or equivalent egg beaters
1/2 cup all purpose flour (I would like to try this with wheat flour someday!)
1 tsp vanilla essence
3 table spoons sugar (This helps to make our pancakes be crispy)
pinch of salt.
1 Apple
Non Stick cooking spray
Light Pancake Syrup
Cinnamon Grinder / Powder
Powdered Sugar to sprinkle (You can use a mixture of cinnamon sugar instead)

Method

Warm the milk in microwave. Stir in sugar, pinch of salt and vanilla essence. Whip the egg and slowly add to the milk whipping continuously. Add the flour and whip to make a pourable thick batter.



Slice apple into thin slices as shown.Heat a round pan with slightly tall edges on medium heat and when hot spray some non stick cooking oil. Add apple slices and light fry each side for couple of minutes.



Do not overcook the apples, cook enough just for them to change their color and caramalize a bit. Set Aside onto a plate.



Heat same pan on medium heat and check hotness by sprinkling little water on it to see if it sizzles. Spray oil when pan is hot and then lift the pan up and pour some batter and do a round swirling motion to let the batter move around and coat the complete pan. Add the rest of the batter at the centre. And swirl pan around to get an even spread not too thick. Place the pan back and continue heating on medium without disturbing the pancake.



As the pancake cooks, the top will start going dry and might puff up from trapped air. Loosen the pancake from sides and keep pressing down on the pancake as it cooks when it starts to swell up with trapped steam. This is to make sure the pancake is golden brown evenly and crispy.



Check the underside of the pancake and if it crispy and brown, spray just a bit of oil on the top side and flip the pancake.



On the side you just flipped up, lay the apple slices like pizza toppings. Cook on slightly lower heat because the drier side gets crispier faster. Cook till pancake is crispy and slide onto the plate.



Add Pancake syrup in an outward spiral starting from the centre. Grind Cinnamon all over the pancake and using a collander sprinkle powdered sugar.



Cut into individual portions using a pizza cutter and serve.

Variations

You can try wheat flour with a pinch of baking powder. Different toppings can also be tried like bananas.

Calories

Masala Egg Toast

This is the savory version of the french toast. It is great by itself or when served with cilantro chutney. It tastes great with a harder variety of bread like french/italian loaf. To make it healthy we can use sprouted grain eziekel bread and cholestorol free egg beaters. These can be substituted with any bread and eggs if preferred.

Ingredients

1 small tub egg beaters (equivalent to two large eggs)
1 cup chopped red onion
1 tsp ginger garlic paste
2 tsp milk
salt per taste
1 tsp garam masala
1 tsp red chillie powder
3 whole green chillies chopped into rounds
1/2 cup chopped cilantro
2 slices Italian/French/Eziekel/White Bread
Non stick cooking spray / oil

Method

Mix egg beaters, milk, salt, garam masala, red chilli powder, ginger garlic paste and whisk lightly. Mix cilantro, green chillies and chopped red onion.


Pour mixture into a large shallow bowl or plate in which a bread slice can be dipped.

Pre-Heat a non-stick pan on medium heat and spray with non stick cooking spray.

Dip bread in the egg mixture to cover it on both sides. Soak it so that it does not get squishy yet is considerably infused with liquid.

Drop in the hot pan on oil, and do not disturb till bottom side is done. This way it will come off the pan easily without sticking. You can spoon a bit of egg mixture on the top side while it cooks in the pan.

Loosen with a flipper and flip to the other side quickly and again do not disturb.

Cut into long rectangular pieces and garnish with cilantro and sprinkle some garam masala on top. Serve with cilantro chutney or tomato ketchup.

Variations

You can add any of chopped onions, spinach, julienned mushrooms etc to the mixture.

Calorie Count

Bread 100 per slice

Eggs 60

Onions, ginger, garlic etc 30

Milk/oil spray 10

Total 300

Flandango

Flandango also known as flan / creme caramel / caramel custard is a spanish dessert. This is a quick and lower calorie version using cholestorol free egg beaters.

Ingredients
1 5 fl oz evaporated milk (unsweetened condensed) 1 tub original egg beaters (no yolk cholesterol free) equivalent to two large eggs. 2 corningware 70z/200ml soufflé/flan/custard/crème brulee cups (ceramic, unglazed, straight edge, ridged) 1 tea spoon brown sugar or white sugar sprinkled with some water drops for caramelization 8 tea spoon white sugar for custard half tea spoon vanilla essence

 Method

Microwave 1tsp sugar with half tsp water in each custard cup for 1min then 10 sec intervals till sugar is caramelized.

Heat milk for 1.20 seconds in the microwave. In another cup take egg beaters liquid and a egg whip. Pour warmed milk into this cup in a slow trickle while continuously whipping the egg beaters liquid to infuse warm milk. Do this to avoid the eggs from getting scrambled and cooked because of sudden mixing with hot milk.

Add 1 tea-spoon vanilla extract and approx 8 tea spoons sugar and mix till sugar dissolves.

Pour mixture in cups slowly over the caramelized sugar.

Take hot tap water in a sauce-pan and pour it in a big baking pan in a oven pre-heated to 350deg farenheit. Place cups in this pan so that water climbs up close to the edge of the cups but not completely. Bake for 25 to 30 minutes.

If flan is done in the oven, it will be overdone on your plate. Usually the top just about starts getting a color, so stop just before you think flan is done and leave the flan in the baking tray for a while with stove door open. If you insert a tooth pick it should not come out wet. Take out and refrigerate at least six hours. Insert knife at edge of the cup, hold the knife, and rotate cup against the cutting edge of the knife without moving the knife.

Then give the cup a bit of a jiggle to loosen the flan from the sides. Place a serving plate face down on top of the custard cup and then invert and give the back of the cup a thwack and jiggle it a bit and lift.

Enjoy!

  Calorie Count

Eggs 60

Milk 200

Sugar 140

Total 4 serving, two custard cups (Desserts always for splitting with someone J).

Per person 100

Variations You can use Fruit preserves, Agave Nectar, Jams as a substitute for caramelized sugar.