the best and fluffiest butter milk pancakes!

     Well, that’s what KITTENCAL announced them as when she introduced this recipe to the legions of recipe fanatics who pour over the 399,000 recipes posted on RecipeZarr. A plethora of wonderful and sometimes (not very often) just so-so offerings. (Loved by the author of course - why else would they want to see it in print?). Anyway, the following recipe is almost identical to the one I have been using for over 60 years and which my father used when he served up his glorious batches of delicious hotcakes every Sunday morning when I was growing up. And, to top it off, prepared by him from the time he was a young bachelor of 17 or 18 (very young he was, from his telling), to the year he died at age 76. So, except for one ingredient and a somewhat different method of putting it all together, here is the magic formula – try it, you will definitely not go wrong.

from KITTENCAL via RecipeZaar
15 pancakes

          2 cups of flour
          1 teaspoon baking soda
          2 teaspoons baking powder
      3-4 tablespoons sugar
          1 teaspoon salt
          2 large eggs
   1 3/4 cups buttermilk
       1/2 cup sour cream
      5 tablespoons melted butter
          1 teaspoon vanilla (optional)

1.   In a large bowl combine the flour, baking soda, baking powder, sugar and salt.
2. In another bowl whisk eggs, buttermilk, sour cream, melted butter and vanilla (if using) add to the flour mixture; whisk until smooth (the batter will be thick!).
3. Let the mixture sit for 5 minutes at room temperature.
4. After 5 minutes whisk or mix again.
5. Drop at 1/4 cup of batter onto a medium-hot skillet: cook until lightly browned on the bottom, turn and cook until browned.

     The difference between this recipe and the one I have used for decades is the sour cream. Sour cream is a great addition, making the pancakes very slightly heavier (of little consequence). Also, I use a full 2 cups of buttermilk and 1 3/4 cups of flour, which seems to balance out the ingredients, the outcome being almost identical. And, I mix the batter as little as possible, adding a small amount of additional buttermilk if it is too thick, and placing it in a warm spot for about 20 minutes before scooping it onto the griddle.
        The manner, and order in which my father put the ingredients together is very old fashioned, but the result? who can tell? If you wish to know his “old-fashioned” way - as used in lumber camps and ranches where he worked as a young man - let me know, and I shall pass it on to you.

      You are no doubt wondering what brought on this culinary addition here? Well, it’s really quite simple. My son and his family were to have a pancake breakfast at our home last Sunday, but unfortunately he had come down with a fever. An attack from some bug or other that kept growling around in his stomach in a painful manner. This was a day or so after arriving back from a holiday with his family in Mexico. I mean, the mind works overtime on that kind of information. Anyway, he was sent off to bed and I assured him that the buttermilk and sour cream purchased to go into the pancakes would keep, and that we would see them the following Sunday a.m. I also said, "God willing!", and told him to just get better.

     Well, he did, but Brie – his wife – didn’t, she got whatever bug it was they decided to share and spent a day or two in bed, saw the doctor, had an exam (is waiting for the results), and slowly began to feel better. Yes, they would certainly be having breakfast with us this Sunday (today) and not to worry.

     Not so fast. It turned out that friends of theirs were on the way down from Alberta and one of the Gulf Islands - even as we were speaking of the coming breakfast together - and had made other plans for our guests. So, to make a long story short, Janet and I had a full pancake breakfast for two this morning - 

                                                              Fruit

                                                              Bacon and eggs

                                                              Pancakes (with Maple Syrup)

     Most enjoyable it was too. Couldn’t waste the buttermilk and sour cream now, could we?