Back to Reality

For the last few weeks my cooking has been turning out surprisingly well and I've been genuinely happy with pretty much everything I've made. I don't know if it's that my kitchen skills are improving or that I've had some luck in selecting good recipes. This past Saturday I came back to kitchen earth when I attempted to make "Cranberry Apple Pancakes."

I discovered the recipe on Thursday, during my bi-weekly menu planning session, and it sounded absolutely divine! Cranberries and apples both sound so full of fall cheer and deliciousness. When combined with pancakes, I imagined that all that good stuff could only get better (like in an apple cranberry crisp). Sadly, I was mistaken. Very mistaken.

Everything started out well, although it took quite awhile to chop up the apples and cranberries. The batter was full of whole wheat flour and oat bran. It sounded so healthy and delicious!

Then I started frying them. I set the stove on to the temperature I use to cook normal pancakes so I was quite dismayed to discover that, in no time at all, they had turned quite black.

Oh well, I told myself that one can't expect anything of the first pancake, it's "for the dog," as they say. I figured I had just turned the heat up a bit too high so I dropped it to level 3 and tried again... no luck... more black pancakes... I took the empty pan off the heat and waved it around in the air, hoping to cool it down... it still didn't work and my stack of blackened pancakes continued to grow.

This went on and on until the burner was turned almost off and my pancakes, although not as black as the first ones were most definitely not anything I would want to present to company. I felt bad giving them to Woodley, but since he knew I'd been working on breakfast for over and hour I didn't think he would be happy if I set down some yogurt and granola on the breakfast table. Thankfully, he very graciously at the pancakes... and the left overs when I reheated them for him the next morning. (what a great guy!) The pancakes didn't taste horrible, but then, they didn't taste very good either.

But, needless to say, I will not be making those pancakes again and I will not be sharing the recipe. :) Fortunately, since then I seem to have recovered somewhat and haven't had any more disappointments in the last 3 days. (I expect there is likely one just around the bend now though)

Maybe next time I'll try adding some finely chopped apple and cranberry pieces to a pancake recipe that I know works and see how that turns out.

~ElizabethRose~