Whole Wheat Pancakes with Sautéed Apples and Maple Syrup

This morning when we left for the farm market it was 38 degrees. Somehow we are supposed to reach 69 degrees today, but it seemed rather unlikely this morning. When I have to find my gloves I know it is cold. Today we came home with 4 reusable grocery bags full of produce plus an enormous bag of Fuji apples since we bought a big basket. We picked up two bunches of kale for chips, leaf lettuce for lettuce wraps, fresh shitake mushrooms, white onions, tomatoes, green cabbage, red cabbage, broccoli, acorn squash, mature arugula, cilantro, dill and basil. I am probably forgetting a few things but you get the idea.

When we got home I was still cold from being outside this morning. Dan made our green drink while I started making almond milk. We haven’t had any almond milk in the house for a couple of days so I had a double batch of almonds soaking overnight. There was a large amount of almond pulp left over from making the almond milk so I have another “almond cheese” experiment in the oven now. Once I am happy with the recipe I will post it.

After making the almond milk we decided that pancakes would taste good. I haven’t made many pancakes since learning about acrylamide. This morning I threw caution to the wind and made pancakes. I added a generous serving of sautéed apples so that we got plenty of fruit this morning with breakfast. Each morning I like to make certain we get a minimum of two servings of fruit. Once I realized that we sometimes went weeks without eating fruit I decided to add it to our breakfast to try to resolve that deficiency. Crispy apples are one of my favorites. I love their texture, flavor and that they are packed with nutrition and help fight cancer. Always be certain to eat the peel since it contains more of the polyphenols than the apple flesh. Here is what I made for breakfast this morning.

Whole Wheat Pancakes with Sautéed Apples and Maple Syrup
Serves 2

Ingredients:

¼ cup whole-wheat pastry flour (Bob's Red Mill Organic)
¼ cup sprouted whole-wheat flour (Shiloh Farms Organic)
½ teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon cinnamon, ground
½ teaspoon ginger, powder
1 pinch sea salt
½ – ¾ cup almond milk, unsweetened (amount will depend on the flour)
2 tablespoons golden flaxseeds, freshly ground
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
4 Fuji apples, cored and chopped
½ cup water or apple cider
½ tablespoon canola oil
2 teaspoons Earth Balance
2 teaspoons maple syrup (grade B organic)

Directions:

Combine the dry ingredients, flours, baking powder, cinnamon, ginger and salt. Whisk to combine and set aside.

Combine ½ cup almond milk, ground flax, and vanilla and stir to combine.

Add the wet ingredients to the dry and stir to combine. If you still have dry flour in the bowl add a little additional almond milk until the flour is entirely moist. I keep my whole-wheat flour in the freezer so that it stays fresh longer. Keeping it in the freezer results in drier flour so that I frequently need to add additional liquid to all my baked goods.

Cook the apples in water (or cider) until they are the texture you like.

Heat a heavy griddle or pan that has been generously brushed with canola. Drop the pancake batter onto the skillet and cook until bubbles emerge on the top of the pancakes. I make my pancakes small, about 2 tablespoons of batter per pancake. On a cast iron griddle over medium heat it took about 3 minutes before my pancakes were ready to turn. You will know they are done when they puff up from the baking powder.

Serve the pancakes with a little earth balance, and drizzle of maple syrup and the sautéed apples on the side.

Nutritional Information:

Amount Per Serving
Calories - 399.87
Calories From Fat (31%) - 125.58

Total Fat - 15.15g
Saturated Fat - 1.71g
Cholesterol - 0mg
Sodium - 360.31mg
Potassium - 454.49mg
Total Carbohydrates - 70.68g
Fiber - 15.23g
Sugar - 33.52g
Protein - 7.22g

Comments:

The first comment from my husband this morning was "nice flavor on the pancakes what did you add". Now, I don’t know if he was just reacting to the maple syrup and Earth Balance, since he doesn’t get that very often, but he really liked this. I enjoyed the vanilla in the pancakes as well as the cinnamon and ginger. Next time I may add a few chopped nuts to the batter.

Nutritionally this isn’t one of my stellar meals but I think it is okay to eat things like this occasionally. Sometimes I feel like we need to eat something just because it tastes good. Each serving of this meal contains more than 100mg of calcium, 100mg of phosphorus, and 10mcg of selenium.

I used my cast iron griddle this morning to make pancakes and we were not playing nice with each other. My pancakes were sticking and were very difficult to flip. Once I greased the skillet more and turned the heat up the pancakes were easier to flip. I really don’t like to use non-stick cookware but that might be the best pan to use for pancakes given the trouble the cast iron gave me this morning.

I am off to figure out what I am making for dinner tonight, make hummus and kale chips and get in a little workout. I will be back later with a recipe or two. Enjoy your day I know I am going to.