Best Weekend Pancake Recipe!

Pancakes are a fun food I enjoy on occasion and when I do, they better be exceptionally good! Which means, I will make my own mix, using simple ingredients, from my family recipe below: no fillers, no fakes and no flour imposters. 

What’s a flour imposter? It’s flour impersonating a healthy food, because it is made from a healthy ingredient, it pretends to be healthier. But it isn’t because once the healthy ingredient is transformed it into flour it’s an unhealthy substance.

Flour is the main ingredient that makes foods, like pancakes, unhealthy. Why?   

Flour is a problem because just like sugar, it is a highly refined and processed ingredient, a starchy carbohydrate, which means, it will reliably spike blood sugar.

Flour or anything made with flour is quickly converted into glucose by the enzymes in the body, because flour has a large surface area. And when glucose levels surge, blood sugar is elevated, and the body is more likely to store the excess energy as fat.

Flour is starch. And starch is just longer chains of glucose strung together. There is NOT a healthier version of flour! 

Don't be fooled! All types of flour and powdered starches are equally unhealthy. It doesn’t matter if it started as a whole grain, like wheat or brown rice, even nuts like almonds, tiger-nuts, cassava or coconuts. And even if it is a starch from corn, potato, rice or cassava. Once it’s been processed into a flour, it’s lost its functional, healthy power. 

TIPS

Enjoy pancakes at a restaurant. Then you skip the excess of potential left-overs. And eat them as a side dish, along with eggs and fresh fruit. That's the best way to get the full serving of fiber and protein to help balance out the nutritional content of the meal.

Taste the difference and skip the powdered pancake mixes from the store and make your own pancake mix at home, using real ingredients. 

Top with real, maple syrup or real butter. Avoid high fructose corn syrup and other smuggles commonly found in pancake syrups. Maple “flavor” isn’t real and “natural” is another word to signal a smuggle, beware! 

My family recipe! 

Last summer I visited my Aunt on our family farm in Iowa. And she made me these delicious pancakes from a recipe that dates back to the 1960s! They're my absolute favorite! 

Real Buttermilk Pancakes 

Serves 4

3 c. Buttermilk 

2 c. Flour - regular, plain white flour is what I use, skip the healthy imposter substitutes! 

2 teaspoons salt 

1 1/2 teaspoon Baking Soda 

2 Eggs, unbeaten 

1 c. Water 

1/4 c. Butter melted, but not hot 

Mix dry ingredients together. Add wet ingredients. Stir lightly to moisten dry ingredients. Mixture will be thick and lumpy. Drop spoonfuls onto lightly greased griddle, spreading batter with spoon. If non-stick pan, no grease needed. Turn cakes as soon as brown or little bubbles surface and brown the other side. Serve hot!

Try at least one plain or with just butter, you'll taste the homemade difference! 

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