pancake

Beet and Potato Pancake

- Elspeth Leave a comment

My coworker sent me this last week and it’s sad how close it hit home. I love potatoes. Like, LOVE them. More than so many things. My boss is scared to even look at french fries when I am nearby, because he knows I will fly into a rage if anyone touches them.

I think I have a problem.

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Oh, well! Better happy with a potato, than normal and sad without one.

The true name of this dish is roesti. It’s basically a gigantic plate of hashbrowns, but Cook’s Illustrated gave me a lovely variation that I used for inspiration. They added beets, but I one-upped them with the further addition of celery root (aka, the unsung hero of the underworld…get it? Because it’s a root?…Screw you guys, I’M laughing).

I paired it with some goat cheese and horseradish sauce, fried shallots (clutch), maple-cayenne pecans (make extra, for insanely good snacking), and arugula salad. DIVINE.

Make sure to keep the heat on the medium-low side of things, so that you don’t burn the bottom. The pieces all went very well together and I would definitely recommend this as a complete meal, but if you just go with the roesti I think you’ll still be quite happy. I have visions of this with a poached egg for breakfast. Mmmm.

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Potato and Beet Pancake

inspired by Cook’s Illustrated

For the pancake:

3/4 lb Yukon gold potatoes, peeled and shredded
1 small celery root, peeled and shredded
3 medium beets, peeled and shredded (I used both red and gold)
1/4 c finely diced scallions
salt and pepper
6 T butter

For the horseradish sauce:

3 T horseradish
1/2 c goat cheese
3 T sour cream
pepper

For the pecans:

1 c pecans
1/2 cayenne pepper
enough maple syrup to coat the pecans (approx. 1/8-1/4 c)

Fried shallots (fry at a low heat in peanut oil for best flavor)

Arugula salad (I went with a lemon-dijon-honey dressing)

For the pancake, mix the shredded potatoes, celery root, and beets together in a bowl with the salt and pepper. Melt 4 T butter in a large cast-iron pan over medium-low heat. When hot, press the potato mixture in until you have a pretty compact cake. You may need to move the pan around over the heat, so that the pancake is evenly browned. After about 15 minutes, loosen the pancake with a spatula, place a plate over the top, and invert onto the plate. Add the remaining 2 T butter to the pan and melt, then slide the pancake back into the pan to cook on the other side. Brown another 15 minutes.

For the horseradish sauce, simply mix everything together in a bowl.

For the pecans, spray a baking sheet with oil and then mix the pecans, syrup, and cayenne together on top. Spread out into a single layer and bake at 375 for 10 minutes.

To assemble, place a wedge of the pancake on a plate, dollop on some horseradish sauce, sprinkle with the fried shallots, toss the arugula salad in with some pecans, and enjoy the heck out of one fine meal, you sexy son of a B.

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Banana Pancakes

- Elspeth 1 Comment

This isn’t just pancake batter that you throw bananas into. It’s pancake batter made mostly out of the bananas themselves.

BOOM. Just blew your minds.

Since I’ve gone mostly gluten free and vegetarian (now and then you just NEED a burger. Am I wrong? That’s not a “like to have”, it’s a “need to have” kind of food), I’ve been combing Pinterest for recipes that will fit both bills. A lot of vegetarians rely on bread, pasta, etc to fill the void left behind by chickens and other beasts, but the GF thing gets in the way. I’m finding creative recipes and substitutions all over the wonder-webz and this beauty takes the cake for the weekend.

There are two ingredients. That’s right. TWO.

  • 1 banana
  • 2 eggs

Most people have those hanging around, so you can keep your sweatpants on (I know I did) and not worry about having to run to the store first thing on a lazy Sunday morning.

The other beautiful thing, aside from the fact that they are tasty, have a good texture, and take 2 seconds to make, is that you can make them sweet OR savory.

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It’s as if Moses has traipsed down that mountain again to deliver me golden tablets etched with delightful recipes. Thanks, friend.

I added a teaspoon of almond extract and a shake of cinnamon to give mine a little personality, but I think these combos would be great, as well:

  • Chocolate and peanut butter chips (duh)
  • Cinnamon pecan
  • Scallion and shredded cheddar
  • Caper and bacon chunks (one of my favorite combinations ever)

And the list goes on and on.

To get yourself moving, preheat a pan to med-high or 375 degrees if you’re working with a griddle. Mash the banana in a bowl (really make sure it’s smooth) and then beat in the two eggs, one at a time. Mix in any additionals. When the pan is hot and you’ve greased it up with butter or oil, pour a slow stream of batter for a couple of seconds, until you have a nice sized disc. It will spread fairly quickly and be runny, so it’s easy to know when to stop pouring.

Warning: these stick to the pan when they are not cooked enough on one side, so make sure you wait 3-4 minutes before attempting to flip. Make them fairly small so you don’t have to worry about leaving behind an edge as your spatula comes off the surface of the pan. I slid mine around under the pancakes to make sure I had loosened the whole thing up before I attempted to flip. A few edges were lost in the shuffle. I cried. The pancakes mourned.

But then I ate them and it was magical, so all of the sadness was forgotten! I doused mine with some maple syrup and a bit of buttah, and died a little happy joyful heavenly death of wonder.

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