The Way You Know About a Good Melon

You know what I’m talking about.

When I saw this, the most gorgeous video in the world, which I’ve since watched at least 8 times, I knew exactly what my evening would look like.  I just knew.

Side note–my evening was already scheduled to involve Breaking Dawn, Parts 1 and 2.  Adding boozy milkshakes to the mix was the icing on the cake.  Or in this case, the whipped cream on the milkshake.

And so I went about my day.  I walked on the beach with Wooden Nickels and CV(D), I started a book I need to read, and I went to the grocery store.  I cuddled with Baby O.  I made dinner, much like I usually do.   I tried to eat my veggies.

But all the while, there was this nagging thought in the back of my head.  Boozy milkshakes.

And so, in between (spoiler alert!) Bella becoming a vampire, Renesmee growing up at a frightening rate, and Baby O joining everyone who’s anyone on Team Jacob, my night became complete.

These milkshakes, quite simply, are the best things to come out of my kitchen in longer than I care to think about.  It’s not that anything I made was bad,  It’s not even that anything I made wasn’t good.  These are just in an entirely different category.

To make them, you’ll want some quality homemade hot fudge.  You can make this as early as 10 days in advance.  Though I would venture a guess that if you make it 10 days before you want boozy milkshakes, there will be no hot fudge left.  The hot fudge is deep, and dark, and silky smooth.  I made mine while sipping on my first beverage of the day.  I’m on vacation.

To make a generous amount of hot fudge, you will need:

• 2/3 C heavy cream
• 1/2 C light corn syrup
• 1/3 C dark brown sugar, packed
• 1/4 C cocoa powder
• 1/2 tsp. salt
• 6 oz. dark chocolate, chopped and divided
• 2 T butter

Place cream, corn syrup, brown sugar, cocoa powder, salt, and 3 oz. chocolate in small saucepan and bring to boil.  Reduce heat and simmer, stirring occasionally, for 5 minutes, until just so slightly thickened.  Remove mixture from heat and stir in remaining chocolate and butter.  Use immediately, or let cool, and store, covered, in the fridge.

You’ll also want some whipped cream.  I find it works best if you ask a friend to make it, so you can focus on what’s most important.  Which booze should be a part of your boozy milkshake?

Thanks for whipping the cream, so I could agonize about liquor, CV(D).  You’re a true friend.

To make whipped cream, you will need:

• 1 friend who knows whipped cream tips and tricks, like putting the mixer beaters and bowl in the freezer in advance of needed them
• 1/2 C heavy cream
• 2 T powdered sugar (fun fact…CV(D) uses granulated sugar)
• 1 tsp. vanilla (CV(D) won’t hear of this; she deems it unnecessary)

Beat all ingredients till you can flip the mixer or whisk over, and the mixture holds its shape.

When you’ve settled on the booze of your choice (Baileys, please), get things whipped up in your blender.

To make the milkshakes you will need (for each shake):

• 3 scoops vanilla ice cream
• 1 C milk
• 1-2 oz. Baileys Irish Cream (or liquor of your choice)

Blend ingredients in blender till smooth.

Lace a drinking glass with hot fudge, pour in your milkshake, and top with whipped cream and more hot fudge.  Enjoy with vampires and werewolves.

*If you, like so many, are wondering on which side of the Jacob/Edward battle lines your baby lies, may I suggest placing her in front of the television when one character appears alone.  If, five seconds later, she begins to wail like her life depends on it, she is likely not a member of said team.  Just a suggestion.

I Can’t Leave Well Enough Alone

This is not a new finding.

I have a favorite red velvet cupcake, and a favorite cream cheese frosting, and yet I am always looking for something new.

This time around, I made the frosting Joy recommends (or at least, my spin on it) in lieu of my old standby, and was amazed at the difference a hint of cinnamon makes.  Do you see those little flecks in the swirls?  I die!

I made Joy’s cupcakes exactly as she recommended, but I tweaked the frosting recipe so I’d have a higher cream cheese to butter ratio, and enough to be piped on my dozen cupcakes.  These are my new fave, and dare I say it? Better than these!

To make enough frosting for a dozen cupcakes, you will need:

• 4 T unsalted butter, softened
• 8 oz. cream cheese, softened
• 4 or 5 C powdered sugar
• scant 1/2 tsp. cinnamon

Cream butter and cream cheese in mixer till smooth.  Slowly add powdered sugar till incorporated.  Add cinnamon.  When everything is well-mixed, I like to crank up the mixer to whip the frosting for a minute or so.  I like the texture it gives.

 

Biscuits for CV(D)

CV(D) and some of our coworkers, past and present, recently shared a lovely meal at one of my favorite haunts.  We did that thing polite ladies do, where they inquire as to whether anyone is getting an appetizer.  Around those with whom I’m not as well acquainted, I tend to play it shy, and follow others’ leads.  Not so with this crew.  When we did the whole, “are we getting appetizers?” thing, I spoke up right away, bursting at the seams in support of the table biscuits. They were embarrassingly large, and melt in your mouth amazing.

Looking to replicate those buttery, layered, flaky, disks in her own kitchen, CV(D) asked me for my most favorite biscuits.  I emailed her a link for Ina’s, which I’ve made several times without being disappointed (duh).

Never being one to leave things alone, however, I didn’t make those for Thanksgiving.  I made Joy the Baker’s cheddar chive and jalapeno (but without the jalapeno) biscuits instead.  They’re from her cookbook, which I haven’t whipped out much since this summer, and miss terribly.  They came to me in a vision in between Thanksgivings two and three, when I started shamelessly adding all the foods I missed not having eaten yet to my final Thanksgiving table.

And they hit the spot, with that same comforting taste our table biscuits had so many weeks before.  Oh man, were my favorite parts those cheesy bits that oozed out through the sides.  See ‘em down there?

Our final Thanksgiving feast was one for a mere five people.  I made 15 biscuits.  No one was too upset that there were so darn many of them.  Especially those of us with gravy in serious need of sopping up.

To make 15 of your own, you will need:

• 3 C flour
• 1 T sugar
• 4 1/2 tsp. baking powder
• 3/4 tsp. cream of tartar
• 3/4 tsp. salt
• 3/4 C cold buttermilk, plus more for topping
• 1 egg
• 3/4 C extra-sharp cheddar cheese, cut into small cubes
• 1 medium jalapeno, seeds partially removed, diced small (this was not something lying around in my kitchen on Thanksgiving evening, so I completely left it out)
• 1/4 C minced chives
• 3/4 C unsalted butter, cold, cut into small cubes
• coarse sea salt, for topping

Place rack in center and upper third of the oven and preheat oven to 425 degrees.  Line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper, and set aside.

Place flour, sugar, baking powder, cream of tartar, salt, and butter in bowl of food processor.  Pulse mixture until butter is the size of small peas.  This is the lazy man’s method.  Alternately, do this in a mixing bowl, mixing everything except the butter first, then cutting in the butter with a pastry cutter or two forks.

In a small bowl (or measuring cup if you don’t like doing dishes), whisk together buttermilk and egg.

Pour flour mixture into large bowl, add cheese, jalapeno (if using), and chives.  Create a small well in the center of the flour mixture, and add buttermilk mixture all at once.  Toss together with a fork, making sure that all the flour bits are moistened by the buttermilk.  Mixture will be shaggy.  That’s that flaky biscuit goodness that we all love.  Turn dough out onto lightly floured space, and knead for 8-10 minutes, to bring everything together.  Smack that dough out to a 1 1/2 inch thickness, and start cutting 2 1/2 inch circles.  You can do this with a biscuit cutter, or the mouth of a drinking glass.  When you’ve cut all the circles you can, bring the remaining dough back together, and pound it to a 1 1/2 inch thickness again.  Keep repeating the cutting process until you’ve used all your dough.

Place biscuits on baking trays, brush with buttermilk, and top with salt.  Bake 12 – 15 minutes.  Eat them as soon as you possibly can.*

*Biscuits are always best immediately, but when you’re preparing a feast, that’s not always an option.  In that case, let them cool completely, and reheat them in the oven the next day.

We put our leftovers on top of this.

Life Lessons

In my 28 years of existence on God’s green earth, I’ve learned a thing or two.  Important life lessons, like:

• It’s worth spending money on people who know what they’re doing really well.
• At least 95% of Season 6 of “The Hills” is totally scripted.
• There will be an answer, let it be.
• Cooking is therapeutic; baking, even more so.
• It’s not dinner until you dump a cup of Parmesan cheese on top.
• The book is always better than the movie.
• It is what it is.

And while baking (though not therapeutically), I learned something new.  Something to which I will cling for the rest of my days:

• Never try to make something with bourbon and chocolate chips healthy.

You probably just read that and thought, “duh.”  But, dear readers, sometimes I get ideas in the kitchen, and I make little tweaks on recipes.  Sometimes wonderful things happen. The first time I tweaked Joy the Baker’s Mommom’s bourbon-spiked banana bread (which, coincidentally, was the first time I made Joy the Baker’s Mommom’s bourbon-spiked banana bread), however, it didn’t go so well.

I did this dumb thing where I added whole wheat flour because I felt like it.

There’s no excuse for that.

Whole wheat flour has no place in a bourbon-spiked banana bread.  Whole wheat flour is for the birds.

The other night, I had 3 bananas sitting listlessly on the kitchen counter, and I wanted a redo.  So I made this bread again.  I brought it to work.  And it got gobbled up faster than you can say Joy the Baker’s Mommom’s bourbon-spiked banana bread.  Therein, a lesson.  Never try to make things with bourbon and chocolate chips healthy.  This is no place for whole wheat flour.  It’s a place for vices coming together in one glorious loaf.

To make one, you will need:

• 2 C flour
• 3 tsp. baking powder
• 1/2 tsp. salt
• 1 stick unsalted butter, softened
• 1 C sugar
• 2 large eggs
• 3 ripe-overripe bananas
• 1 tsp. lemon juice
• 3 T bourbon
• 1 C coarsely chopped walnuts (I omitted)
• 1 C chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Grease and flour a 9 inch loaf pan.

Sift first 3 ingredients together in medium bowl.

In separate bowl, cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy, 3-5 minutes.  Add eggs, one at a time, beating for 1 minute between each addition, stopping to scrape down sides of bowl as necessary.  Stir in bananas, lemon juice and bourbon.  Fold in flour all at once and beat till almost incorporated.  Fold in walnuts and chocolate chips with spatula.

Spoon mixture into loaf pan.  Bake 45 minutes to an hour, or until skewer inserted in center comes out clean (gooey chocolate chips aside).  Let cool in pan 20 minutes before inverting on cooling rack.  Slice into it shortly thereafter.

Favorites

I have this thing about hyperbole.  I live for it.  See what I did there?  It’s no great secret that I speak in absolute extremes.  Often whatever I do is the best _______ ever.  And I mean it.  So when Joy and Tracy gave their podcast listeners homework the other day, I knew I could make it happen.  All I have to do is come up with 5 favorites right now.  Favorites?  I love favorites!  Let’s go!

1.  The Beatles

*source

I make a new playlist for each season, and when I heard The Beatles blasting at Trader Joe’s yesterday morning, I knew it was time to delete “Winter 2011″ and get started on “Spring 2012.”  There are a couple bands who see heavier rotations once the weather heats up, Dave Matthews and Mumford among them.  But it doesn’t get better than the Fab 4.

2.  Liege Waffles

At least, I think they’re my favorite right now.  One of my favorite readers (hi reader!) emailed me after a glamorous ski trip with her family and said she couldn’t get enough of these crazy waffles on her trip.  She did some research and decided they were Liege waffles, emailed me and asked whether I knew anything about them because she was dying to make them again.  I had never heard of them, but as soon as Wikipedia told me they feature, “chunks of pearl sugar which caramelize on the outside of the waffle when baked,” I gasped.  I’ve had Liege waffles many times before, at our neighborhood Farmers’ Market.  I tracked down this recipe, which, as soon as I own a waffle iron, should be fantastic.

3.  New Stationery

I had been squeaking by with my husband’s and my wedding stationery for the past two and a half years, with nothing to show for my “new” last name.  I am a firm believer in thank you notes and monograms.

4.  Lilacs

OMG, lilacs.  Wooden Nickels recently informed me that most gardeners deem these purple plants inferior, but I don’t care what they say.  We had one right by the side of our house growing up, and I would always cut a couple stems and bring them inside to no avail during the 10 days they bloomed.  The branches are meant to stay outdoors, and never lasted more than a day in water.  For the hot second I could keep them alive, they made my whole room smell like heaven on earth.  This beauty is on the first .25 miles of my running route (and thus, also the last .25 miles), and I’m convinced the poor people who own this yard know me as “that weird girl who always stops and smells our flowers when she runs/walks by.”  Oh well.

5.  Trader Joe’s

*source

Trader Joe’s, how do you pull off being the best grocery store in the entire world?  Every time I shop at you, I spend considerably less than I do at my big name grocery store, and my snooty healthy grocery store.  And every time I go I stray considerably from my grocery list.  I come across items that friends have recommended (half baked ciabattini rolls, pita crisp crackers, and dark chocolate non-pareils just from yesterday’s trip), and always find about twelve additional things I don’t really need but cannot live without.  Plus shopping there is just an overall pleasant experience, which is a claim not many grocery stores can hold.

Those are my current faves.  What are yours?

Friends

Ten years ago (yes, ten!) , I set off for the University of Maryland after spending a whopping 18 years in Pennsylvania.  I adore the town where I grew up.  And when everyone asked me why I wasn’t going to college there, I said, “If I don’t go away to college, I won’t ever go anywhere.  I’ll be right back after I graduate and I don’t want to say I’ve never lived anywhere else.”

So you know how that one ends.  Because here I am in DC with no plans to move back to PA anytime soon.

I hate it.

And I also sometimes love it.

If you’ve ever moved to a new place you likely understand this raging internal conflict.

The one thing that has made this whole transplant experience worthwhile are the friends I’ve made here.  In fact, I’m sure I would be quite miserable without them.  I am beyond fortunate that I work with some of the best girls in town.

And they humor me by coming over for dinner every now and again.  You know three of them already.  That’s AGOMYR in the bottom left corner, Hey Girl Hey in the bottom right, and of course, CV smack in the center with the blue dress.  The lovely lady in the top left of the picture is my ex (roommate, that is), and the fifth member of our little crew is our resident health expert.  She does crazy things like exhibit self control when faced with a plate full of desserts.  We don’t know how she does it, either.

These ladies came over the other night, so I baked.

I started getting Joy’s Dark Chocolate Ganache Tart with Fresh Berries and Whipped Cream together the evening before everyone arrived, and I had a little epiphany.  Said epiphany was not that Joy’s cookbook is the new best thing that happened to my kitchen, because I figured that out already.  It was that the baking I was doing was a different kind entirely.

If you hang around here long enough, you’ll realize that baking is part of my everyday life.  I’m never too far from needing thirty cupcakes, a batch of brownies to bring to Grandma Glass of Milk, muffins for a staff breakfast, or cookies, just because I don’t like to have an empty cookie jar.

But that’s not this kind of baking.  That’s the kind you can do with your eyes closed if you have to.  This kind of baking was the kind that matters.  It’s the kind that takes time, and thought, and care.  It can’t be done in an hour.  As I put together the tart shell with my own two hands, and whipped up the ganache, I thought about how this is the kind of cooking that you want people to feel.  You want your friends to take a bite and realize you’re telling them something.

I’m so glad you came over.

You make living here fun.

Thank you.

To make a tart to feed your friends, you will need:

For the shell (which tastes like a big giant graham cracker):

• 1 1/2 C all purpose flour
• 1/2 C powdered sugar
• 1/2 tsp. salt
• 1/2 tsp. ground cinnamon
• scant 1/4 tsp. ground ginger
• 1 stick unsalted butter, cold, small diced
• 1 large egg yolk, slightly beaten

Combine flour, sugar, salt, and spices in large bowl.  Cut in butter with your fingers.  This means you want to get in there and smush the little butter pieces until they get all mixed with the flour.  If you’ve never done this before, it may feel weird, and like you’re not getting anywhere.  But keep at it, until your biggest pieces of butter are no bigger than a little pea.  Once incorporated, add the egg yolk and mix things together again with a fork.  Dump the mixture into a nonstick tart pan, pressing the crust flat to the bottom of the pan, and up the sides.  Place tart crust in the freezer for an hour.

For the ganache:

• 8 oz. dark chocolate, finely chopped (I used Scharffen Berger)
• 1 1/4 heavy cream
• 1/2 stick butter, at room temperature, cut in half

Place chocolate in medium bowl.  In small saucepan, heat heavy cream till it barely simmers.  Pour cream over chocolate, and let sit for one minute.  Stir gently with whisk, until chocolate and cream are combined.  Add the pieces of butter, and stir in with spatula until melted.  Set ganache aside and let it cool to room temperature.

Place a rack in the upper third of the oven, and heat the oven to 350 degrees.  Butter one side of a piece of foil and press buttered side against the crust.  Bake shell for 20 minutes, remove foil, and bake for another 15.  Remove shell from oven and let cool completely.

You’re almost there.

For the topping:

• 1 1/2 C fresh berries that you would want to eat with chocolate (Joy recommends raspberries and blackberries)
• 1 C heavy cream
• 3 T powdered sugar

In a mixer fitted with whisk attachment (or with your hand mixer) beat cream and sugar until stiff peaks form.

Pour cooled ganache into cooled shell.  Top with whipped cream and berries.

Serve to people you love.

Dear readers, in case you’re all sentimental now and in dire need of a good laugh, please observe what happened after my husband returned home from his guys’ night adventure and ate his own piece.

Random Things

1.  Today is Pi Day.

As such, I made some Jello Pudding Pies and brought them to work.  Jello Pudding Pies are like, the easiest pies in the world to make (easy as pie…see what I did there?) but I got a little anxious about these guys.  There are about a million recipes for Jello Pudding Pie out there on the internets, and how was I to know which one was right and which wasn’t?  Two percent milk or skim?  Pudding/Cool Whip mixture, or all pudding with Cool Whip on top?  Things seemed to work out okay in the end, or so said everyone I fed.

2.  Yesterday was Taco Tuesday.

That’s not a thing.  It became one while I was menu planning on Sunday.  I always ask my husband if there’s anything in particular he wants on the table that week, and he said tacos, right as I arrived at the blank space next to Tuesday.  There you have it.  Taco Tuesday is born.

3.  I am not a single girl.

But that doesn’t mean I can’t eat like one.  I finished dinner the other night and wasn’t hungry.  Unfortunately, my body is finely tuned to crave at least one tiny morsel of something sweet at the end of each meal, which meant the wheels in my head were spinning.  I could eat a Hershey kiss, but that would mean opening the whole bag.  I could eat a spoonful of Nutella, but I lost count of how many times I’d already done that.  I could make Joy the Baker’s Single-Girl Melty Chocolate Peanut Butter Cake!  She mentioned it on one of the podcasts and it sounded perfect for an old married gal whose husband doesn’t eat sweets.

How closely do you read my posts?  Did you notice the part where I said I wasn’t hungry after dinner?  I just wanted one little sweet bite?  This is not one little sweet bite.  I thought it would be.  See, you mix all these little spoonfuls of stuff into a little bowl.  Then you pour the contents of the little bowl into a little baking dish.  But what you take out is not little.  This is one decadent dessert.  It’s incredibly rich, incredibly chocolatey, and incredibly awesome.  Oh well, so I ate more chocolate than I planned on for a day.  I’m no worse for the wear.

The best part about single girl melty chocolate peanut butter cake is you need absolutely no reason to make it.  The recipe yields one serving, so it’s not like the leftovers will be taunting you for the next week.  Make it, eat it, get over it.  That’s what single girls do.

This is my plate after I finished.  Is that an overshare?

I followed Joy’s recipe exactly, though my cake needed about double the oven-time, and still didn’t keep its shape out of the pan.  I’m totally fine with that though.  Just meant more chocolate goop to lick clean.

Fat Tuesday

Happy Mardi Gras everyone!

Though beignets are the traditional N’awlins breakfast, pancakes are a staple on dinner tables everywhere tonight.

Unfortunately, it’s not a tradition we’re continuing this year, as we’re wolfing down dinner before heading to watch our beloved Terps play ball.

But if you’re looking for pancakes dear readers, you know you’re in the right place.  Pancakes are one of the reasons I live and breathe.  They’re the reason I wake up early on Sundays.  Here are my four faves.

Buttermilk Pancakes – These are the ultimate in classic pancakes.  They’re fluffy and light, and (wait for it) are equally good with or without chocolate chips.  I don’t say that about just any pancake.  No buttermilk?  Use an equal amount of milk, and add 1 tsp. either white vinegar or lemon juice.

Pillow (Eggnog) Pancakes – Though eggnog seems a thing of the past, if it’s chilly where you are right now, this is what you need to eat for dinner.  You don’t actually need eggnog to make them.   Instead, the blend of spices mimics everyone’s favorite December drink.

Banana Pancakes – I would venture a guess that this exact recipe is the one that inspired the Jack Johnson song of the same name.  They’re the best banana pancakes in town.  Plus they contain fruit.  Healthy!

Lemon Blueberry Pancakes – If you’ve never made a smitten kitchen recipe before let me tell you two things.  One:  Get busy!  Deb’s recipes are some of the very best, and there are so many to choose from.  Two:  Start with these pancakes.  They are the epitome of what Deb does right (which is almost everything).

Smashed Raspberry Chocolate Chunk Pancakes -  There is one food blogger who will not let Deb run away with the “best pancakes ever” title, and that’s Joy the Baker.  She has a reverence for pancakes you can’t argue with, and these are no exception.

So fry up some bacon and get on it!  Happy pancake day!

Finally

These were a long time coming.

They’ve been a nagging thought in the back of my head since Joy first posted them in October, 2010.

But the timing was never right.

Frying onion rings takes several dishes, splattering oil, and a commitment to thousands of calories.

Which I was ready to make one night instead of the healthier, more well-balanced dinner I had planned.

I scrapped that veggie-fest, cranked up the heat on some oil, and fried my heart out till I came up with these beauties.

I ate them off my china plate.  Because the little pink roses helped take out a lot of the fat content.  I’m convinced.

Oh, it was a beautiful night.

And oh, I bought so many fruits and vegetables at the grocery store today.

Major penance to be done.

Hello green monsters everyday for breakfast between now and the end of the summer.

But have you ever made your own onion rings?  The difference is remarkable.  Night and day.  Life-changing.  Just do it.

To make 25 onion rings, you will need:

• 2 tablespoons barbecue sauce
• 1 tablespoon hot sauce
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon fresh ground black pepper
• 1 large onion
• 2 cups buttermilk
• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 2 teaspoons salt
• 1/2 teaspoon paprika
• 1/2 teaspoon fresh ground black pepper
• 1 quart flavorless oil, be it canola, vegetable or peanut

To make some tangily wonderful dipping sauce, you will need:

• 1/2 cup sour cream (I used plain yogurt)
• 3 tablespoons buttermilk
• 2 tablespoons barbecue sauce
• 1 teaspoon hot sauce
• two pinches salt
• 2 tablespoons fresh chives, slices tiny

Cut the bottom and top ends of onion off.  Slice into rings, and separate.  Discard inner, smallest rings.  Place onions in bowl and toss with barbecue sauce, hot sauce, salt and pepper till well-mixed.  Pour buttermilk over top until it covers rings.  Let sit for 15 minutes.

Meanwhile, combine flour, salt, paprika, and pepper in large bowl.

Begin heating the oil in large, heavy-bottomed pot (I used my Dutch oven).  Use a candy thermometer to monitor the oil.  You want the onions to hit the grease at 360 degrees.

While you’re waiting for all that to happen, make the dipping sauce.  Whisk together all the sauce ingredients, in, you guessed it, another bowl.

When the oil is good and hot, prep the onions by dunking them in the flour mixture and tossing to coat completely.  Gently place 4 or 5 in the oil.  Let sizzle for a minute or two before turning with a pair of tongs.  When you’ve achieved the perfect golden brown you’re searching for, remove to a paper towel lined baking sheet and keep warm in a low oven.  Continue prepping and frying onions, keeping an eye on the oil temperature.  It will start to creep downward as you put more onions through the ringer.

Serve immediately with a sprinkling of sea salt and a good dunk in sauce.

Joy’s Pancakes

Well hello.

From my breakfast table.

Where this picture says it all.  These are Joy’s pancakes.  Joy takes pancakes more seriously than I do, which means I hold her in the highest regard.  When I saw these on her blog, I gasped and ran to the kitchen.  They’re even better than they look.  And the raspberries and whole wheat flour I added totally cancel out the chocolate chunks?

Right?

To make pancakes for a hungry twosome, you will need:

• 1/2 C all purpose flour
• 1/2 C whole wheat flour
• 1 T brown sugar
• 1 tsp. baking powder
• 1/2 tsp. salt
• dash cinnamon
• 1 C buttermilk
• 2 T butter, melted, and cooled slightly
• 1 large egg
• 1 tsp. vanilla
• 1/3 C chocolate chunks (I used minis)
• 1/2 C fresh rasberries
• oodles of maple syrup

In medium bowl, whisk flours, brown sugar, baking powder, salt, and cinnamon.  In smaller bowl (or measuring cup if you don’t like doing dishes), whisk buttermilk, butter, egg and vanilla.  Whisk wet ingredients into dry, and don’t worry if you still have small lumps.  Stir in chocolate chunks.  Heat a pat of butter over a griddle or frying pan.  Pour batter, by the quarter-cupful onto the pan.  Let it sizzle, untouched, until small bubbles form on top and the edges of the pancake start to pull away from the pan.  Flip pancake and cook for one more minute on the other side.  Repeat with remaining batter until pancakes are finished.  If you’re not cooking them to order, keep pancakes warm on a baking sheet in a low oven.

In a small bowl, smash raspberries with a fork.  Divide mix over and in between tall stacks of pancakes.

Drown in syrup.

Savor Saturday.