Ren Behan - Author Wild Honey and Rye

Food Writer

Maple Syrup

Warm Banana and Maple Syrup Pancakes with Cinnamon Cream

It’s half term and we’ve just got back from a wonderful couple of days in Bath. It’s a city I’ve never been to before and I thought it was absolutely stunning. I do have some photos and foodie tips to share, but as we’re a little pinched on time, I just wanted to share a quick recipe for yummy banana pancakes with maple syrup for the time being. This is a great way to use up bananas which are perhaps going a little bit brown or spotty, by the time they are slightly caramelized and wrapped up warm inside a pancake you’ll never know. We love pancakes with bananas! Of course, a little teaspoon of Nutella wouldn’t be out of place here either.  

You could serve these with either a plain whipped cream, or you can flavour it with a teaspoon of ground cinnamon, vanilla seeds or a teaspoon of orange zest before you whisk. If you are feeling extra decadent, pour a little melted chocolate sauce over it too.

Shrove Tuesday this year is creeping up and is on Tuesday 21st February. Hopefully I’ll have time to sneak in a couple of extra pancake posts!

There are a hundred pancake recipes out there, but I used this one for ‘Perfect Pancakes’ from BBC Good Food .

Warm Banana and Maple Syrup Pancakes with Cinnamon Cream

(serves 2)

Ingredients:

2-3 bananas, peeled and sliced (spotty bananas are fine!)
1 tablespoon sugar
Large knob of unsalted butter
Good splash of maple syrup

150 ml double or whipping cream
Teaspoon ground cinnamon

2-4 thin pancakes or crepes such as these

Method

Melt the sugar and butter in a frying pan and place the sliced bananas in without over crowding the pan. Cook for a minute or so on each side (until golden) and carefully flip over. Add a splash of maple syrup which should make a nice sauce.

Whisk the double cream or whipping cream with a teaspoon of ground cinnamon.

Re-heat a few pre-made pancakes (or just keep them warm if you’re making them fresh.)

Put your bananas inside the pancake, roll up and dollop over some of your whipped cream. 

A quick chocolate sauce

100 g milk or dark chocolate (Fair Trade if possible)
2 tablespoons double cream

Melt the chocolate and cream in a bowl over a pan of hot water (make sure the bowl doesn’t touch the water and keep stirring.) Use to top pancakes.

I’m sending this across to Kate at Turquoise Lemons for her No Waste Food Challenge. This month, Kate challenged us to use up leftover spotty bananas!

Picture 

What will you be filling your pancakes with this year?! 

Vegan Chocolate Cake with Pistachio Nuts

I should have known when I made the Panettone and Nutella Bread Pudding, that the healthy eating plan would go downhill. But I have long had my eye on a very special vegan chocolate cake recipe from Leon Baking and Puddings Book Three, which I loved reviewing and have been cooking from lots. As this month’s We Should Cocoa challenge, hosted by Chele over at Chocolate Teapot,  was to make a ‘health-conscious’ chocolate recipe, I really couldn’t resist this one any longer. The recipe is called A Very Good Chocolate Cake. And it was, very good indeed!

So, where does the health-conscious angle come into to this chocolate cake? Well, for a start it’s vegan, so it has no animal products in it at all. Secondly, no sugar, instead it calls for agave syrup, which is produced from the Mexican agave plant and is much less likely to give you a sugar rush. Thirdly, eating a chocolate cake (especially one sprinkled with lovely green pistachio nuts)  is good for the soul, and therefore also, in my book counts as being health-conscious…

I have to say that when I looked at the required list of ingredients I was a little perplexed. There was no way, in my mind, that this unusual list of ingredients would come together to make a cake. I did my usual trick of embarking on a recipe before making sure I had everything to hand. I didn’t. So, in place of agave nectar I used a UK-produced Canadian Pure Maple syrup by Clarks that I had been sent to try. It worked perfectly. I used half-fat coconut milk, which was all I had, in place of full fat (healthier still) and I used vegetable oil and a squeeze of clementine juice in place of sunflower oil and lemon juice. Oh, and I flavoured the cake with orange essence instead of vanilla. You can see how I didn’t think it would work, particularly with all the messing around I did with the recipe, but it did!

No one would ever know that this is a vegan chocolate cake. It is moist, and it stays moist for a good few days in a tin as it’s made with oil. It smells divine and has a truffle cake texture with a perfect chocolate hit. It would be perfect for Valentine’s Day too.  Best of all, it is really easy to make. Simply mix the dry ingredients with the wet, pour into a tin and bake. The recipe in the book is decorated with pretty summer flowers, but as it is winter, a sprinkle of vibrant green pistachio nuts seemed to do the trick.

Here’s my amended version, the original, called A Very Good Chocolate Cake, is by the very talented Claire Ptak and Henry Dimbleby.

[gmc_recipe 2280]

Leon Baking and Puddings Book Three is full of little tricks to make recipes healthier, whether it is experimenting with different flours, such as spelt or gluten-free flour or substituting pure cane sugar with honey, maple syrup, agave nectar or stevia. The recipes are well tested and have a broad appeal – it’s well worth putting on your list!

 

As promised, I’m sending this over to the We Should Cocoa challenge. 

For more blog events to get involved in, check out The Food Blog Diary, which lists many different blog events and blog hops to try!

Have you had a chocolate week or a healthy week or a combination of both?

Have you tried any health-conscious chocolate recipes? 

Buckwheat and Buttermilk Pancakes (with Pears and Maple Syrup)

This weekend we treated ourselves to a fine American breakfast of pancakes with maple syrup. I was inspired by a recipe in Diana Henry’s newly re-published book Roast Figs, Sugar Snow ,which is packed full of cold-weather recipes. As it happens, Sunday was lovely and mild, but the pancakes did set us up perfectly for a trip to Peppa Pig World!

Diana’s recipe for ‘Mile-High Buttermilk Pancakes’ comes with an instruction to “bring them to the table in a mile-high pile as if you’re running your own diner – with a big pot of steaming coffee.”  Diana suggests serving her pancakes with date and pecan butter, which sounds divine too – butter, brown sugar, chopped pecans, dates and vanilla, but my cupboard was sadly lacking in any pecans or dates, so I didn’t make the butter. A few pears in the fruit bowl, did, however, inspire me to do as the Poles do and slice some fruit into some of the pancakes as the batter hit the pan. You can do this with peeled apples too, or even banana. Pancakes are also a great way of using up random bags of flour and since I had some organic buckwheat flour (happens to be gluten free)  in the cupboard, I used that instead of plain flour and sweetened the batter up with cinnamon sugar, instead of caster sugar. That’s what I love about pancake batter – it’s a great vehicle for a little twist or two. Adding the buttermilk and beaten eggs whites to the batter are what make Diana’s pancakes soft and light as air.

I’m looking forward to cooking lots more from Diana’s book and giving it proper credit very soon. I’m also going to be meeting her next week (I am SUPER excited) and am looking forward to asking her what her very favourite recipes are from the book.  Any burning questions for me to ask her?

 

Buckwheat and Buttermilk Pancakes (with pears and maple syrup)

(adapted from Diana Henry’s Mile-High Buttermilk Pancakes from Roast Figs, Sugar Snow)

Ingredients:

250g flour – I used organic buckwheat flour, you can use this or plain

1 1/2 tsp baking powder

a pinch of salt

2 tbsp cinnamon sugar

500ml buttermilk (I made my own by adding 2 tbsp lemon juice to 500 ml whole milk and leaving it for ten minutes)

50g melted butter

3 large eggs, 2 of them separated

Vegetable oil or spray for the pan

3 ripe pears or apples sliced

Maple syrup – loads of it!

(You’ll need 3 clean bowls)

Method:

1. Sift the flour, baking powder, salt and sugar into a bowl.

2. Mix the buttermilk, melted butter and eggs together in a second bowl – keeping the two egg whites seperate.

3. Make a well in the centre of the flour bowl and gradually add the buttermilk mixture, whisking as you go along.

4. Beat the two eggs whites with a clean whisk in your third bowl until they form soft peaks. Add a scoop of the beaten egg whites to your pancake batter and gently mix in then add the rest of the egg whites and only stir until it is all mixed in then stop.

5. Heat a small amount of oil in a pan (or use butter) and use a ladle to pour your pancake batter into the pan (you are aiming for small round pancakes – my pan fit in three at a time). Once the batter is in the pan, place a few slices of pears or apples onto each pancake. Bubbles will appear on the sufrace and after a minute or so you can flip them over – they should be golden on the bottom.

6. Add a tiny bit more oil to the pan as you make each batch. Serve as you go along or layer the, up and keep them warm in a low oven.

7. Drizzle with maple syrup once at the table.    

 

As this was an America-inspired breakfast, I’m linking it up with Helen’s Breakfast Club #16 Stars and Stripes, this month hosted by Susan of  A Little Bit of Heaven on a Plate… 

A recipe to bookmark for next Sunday perhaps… How was your weekend? Any tasty treats or adventures to share?