My son went to a friend’s slumber party and came home raving about the Swedish Pancakes his friend’s mom made for breakfast the morning after. He begged me to make them when it came time to host his own slumber party, and my friend and author of a really fun new book series about a fiesty eleven-year old girl who gets into roller derby, Meghan Doherty graciously obliged with her grandmother’s recipe for this family favorite.
Swedish Pancakes, I learned, are kind of like crepes, but perhaps a little more eggy. The version I made were thin and spongey, slightly reminiscent of the Ethiopian crepe-like flatbread called injera in texture though not in flavor. The flavor was tantalizingly of butter.
A light texture with the taste of butter. Like a croissant tastes like butter. Decadent and delicious and addictive.
I altered the recipe a little to make my version of the pancakes wheat-free and dairy free. I also tripled the recipe to make enough for the eleven pre-teen boys and myself and my husband. I cooked them on my cast iron pizza pan and in my itty-bitty one-egg cast iron skillet, and I was at the stove for well over an hour flipping pancakes.
I love substituting spelt flour for wheat flour in recipes. Spelt is an ancient cousin of wheat but has not been as adulterated as our wheat has been. Although spelt is a gluten grain, the gluten protein is different from that of wheat. Many people who cannot tolerate the wheat in our country without uncomfortable symptoms can handle spelt just fine. If you try spelt flour you’ll find love it for its reliability in recipes that call for wheat. I use a one-to-one ratio of spelt flour to wheat flour.
My reward was hearing Meghan’s son declare that my Swedish Pancakes were as good as his mom’s were. While I don’t know about that, I will say that it made for a fun morning.
Good thing that the evils of butter have been debunked and we can recognize that real butter can be a part of a nourishing whole foods diet. I always choose organic butter that is rGbh-free and made with milk from cows that were fed a non-GMO diet.
Here, in Meghan’s own words (with my alterations in parentheses) is the easy recipe for these breakfast treats. Thanks, Meghan!
Swedish Pancakes
Makes enough for 4-5 people.
1 ½ cups flour (spelt flour)
1 tsp salt (sea salt)
2 tsp sugar (organic cane sugar, maple sugar, coconut sugar, maple syrup, or honey)
3 well beaten eggs (organic)
3 cups milk (organic milk substitute of choice: soy, almond, coconut, etc.)
3 tbs butter (organic butter or coconut oil)
Fry at 380 degrees, super hot (medium-high on a gas stovetop). I use pam on the griddle before I pour batter (I used butter to grease the griddle). I usually combine the flour, salt, sugar, and then I melt the butter in the microwave before mixing it into the rest or it gets too lumpy. Wisk or use the hand blender to get smooth batter and all the lumps out or they don’t taste quite right. I do these on the griddle. Just know that they are super runny and will never be round, but firm up in a few seconds. Just cook them a couple minutes or so on each side, or until light brown flecks show up. Super crepe like consistency.
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