Ebelskivers for Brunch on Sunday

Ebelskivers with whipped cream.  Yummy!

We were having a late brunch today, and I wanted to make something different.  I checked the pantry and discovered that I had a half can of chocolate ebelskiver mix from Williams-Sonoma.  A year or so ago I had bought an ebelskiver pan, and I had bought the mix rather than make these from scratch.  Ebelskivers are Danish pancakes that puff up when cooked and that can be made with some kind of filling inside.  Ebelskiver actually means apple slice, because in Denmark the filling is often apples. 

I had some delicious cherry preserves so I decided on using those as the filling, chocolate and cherries go so nicely together. 

Ebelskiver chocolate pancake mix and cherry preserves.

Here is how to make these step by step:

Place mix in a large bowl.  I added a teaspoon of espresso powder.

I added one teaspoon of espresso powder to the chocolate mix.

 Mix together the wet ingredients and beat the egg whites until they stand in stiff peaks.

Egg whites and wet ingredients.

Add wet ingredients to chocolate mix and fold in egg whites. 

Fold in egg whites.

Add 1/4 teaspoon butter to each well of the ebelskiver pan over medium heat until butter bubbles.

Butter is bubbly and ready for the batter to be added.

Add 1 tablespoon of batter to each well of the pan and top each with a teaspoon of cherry preserves.

Top with cherry preserves.

Top each well with another tablespoon of batter.  When pancake has browned flip it over (This is the hard part.  I used two wooden skewers to do this.)

Top each well with one tablespoon of batter.

When brown flip out and onto plate for serving.  Add a dollop of whipped cream.

Brown and ready to serve.

These are often served with powdered sugar or maple syrup, but we are trying to cut down on our sugar consumption so we found the pancakes sweet enough with just the whipped cream.

Topped with whipped cream and ready to enjoy.

Here's a recipe if you would like to try this different type of pancake. 

Ingredients:

• 1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 3/4 tsp. baking soda
• 1 tsp. baking powder
• 1 1/2 Tbs. granulated sugar
• 1/2 tsp. salt
• 3 eggs, separated
• 1 3/4 cups buttermilk
• 4 Tbs. (1/2 stick) unsalted butter, melted
• 1 pint fresh blueberries
• Confectioners' sugar for dusting
• Maple syrup for serving

Directions:

In a bowl, whisk together the flour, baking soda, baking powder, granulated sugar and salt.

In a small bowl, lightly whisk together the egg yolks and buttermilk. Whisk the yolk mixture into the flour mixture until well combined; the batter will be lumpy.

In another bowl, using an electric mixer fitted with the whisk attachment, beat the egg whites on high speed until stiff but not dry peaks form, 2 to 3 minutes. Using a rubber spatula, gently fold the whites into the batter in two additions.

Put 1/2 tsp. butter in each well of a filled-pancake pan. Place over medium heat and heat until the butter begins to bubble. Pour 1 Tbs. batter into each well and cook until the bottoms are golden brown and crispy, 3 to 5 minutes. Put 5 or 6 blueberries in the center of each pancake and top with 1 Tbs. batter. Using 2 wooden skewers, flip the pancakes over and cook until golden and crispy, about 3 minutes more. Transfer to a plate. Repeat with the remaining batter and blueberries.

Dust the pancakes with confectioners' sugar and serve warm with maple syrup. Makes about 40. 

 

You will need an ebelskiver pan however.  You can buy one at Kohls or at Chef's Catalog.

Grace and Grandpat's Pizza From Scratch

Homemade pizza ready for the oven.

While the rest of the family went to the UNC-Virginia Tech Football game (UNC won--go Tarheels)  today, Grace and I stayed home and made a vegetarian pizza from scratch---crust included. I must admit this is the first time I have ever made pizza dough from scratch.

Here's the recipe we used for the pizza dough:
1 (1/4 ounce) package yeast
1 cup warm water
1 tablespoon olive oil
2.5 cups bread flour

Directions:
1.  Mix yeast in warm water until dissolved.
2.  Stir in oil and flour until it forms a dough ball.
3.  Cover bowl with a kitchen towel, place in a warm place.
4.  Let rise for 15 minutes.
5.  Punch down and wrap in Saran wrap and refrigerate for as much as 8 hours. We refrigerated for about an hour.
6.  Remove from fridge, warm up and let rise.
7.  Spread in pizza pan or on baking stone. We used a 12" pizza pan that we bought at Williams-Sonoma.
8.  Add favorite toppings.

This makes enough for 2-12" thin crusts.  I saved half of the dough to make another pizza (the dough will keep in the fridge for 3 days).

Grace spreads dough in the pizza pan.

Oiling your hands with a bit of olive oil makes spreading the dough easier.

We had earlier made our own tomato sauce using a can of diced tomatoes to which we added fresh basil and garlic.  We cooked this down until it became thick.

Spreading the tomato sauce.

For toppings we sauteed onions and mushrooms.

Mushrooms and onions provide topping.

 And of course we added cheese, in this case shredded cheddar.

Grace adds the shredded cheddar cheese.

Into the oven for 15 minutes at 475 degrees.

 We baked it in a preheated 475 degree oven for about 15 minutes until browned.

Bobby B was here so the three of us finished off the pizza (we did save one piece for Dan).  We were so eager to try the pizza that we forgot to take a photo of the finished product. It was a good pizza!!!  And we had fun making it.  

These Shoes Are Made for Walking---Or Not.

Colorful and made for walking.

Colorful and definitely NOT made for walking.

The other morning I needed something from Williams-Sonoma's so instead of going to the gym I headed to Crabtree Valley Mall and walked there before the stores opened.  When W-S opened at ten I had finished my walk and was ready to shop.

There were just a few, mostly elderly, folks walking there early in the morning.

Couple walking hand-in-hand.  Sweet.

Plenty of carts if you want to walk with a young child.

Passed by the bakery and then Godiva's Chocolate store.

Bakery---keep walking.

Godiva's---keep walking.

Passed the Build-a-Bear store.

I liked the sign in one of the store windows.

I'm still playing.

Tired of walking?  Have a rest.

Rest if needed.

 I finished my walk, W-S opened, I did my shopping and was back home by 10:30.

Williams-Sonoma one of my favorite shops at Crabtree Valley Mall.

Chocolate Ebelskivers for Breakfast

Chocolate ebelskivers.

I was over at Southpoint Mall the other day with friend, Mary Todd, where she had to return something at Williams-Sonoma.  It's dangerous for me to go into that store.  I remembered hearing about these little Danish filled pancakes (Ebelskivers) and the pan for cooking them that WS just happened to have.  I came home with a new kitchen toy. I also picked up a can of the chocolate Ebelskiver mix, and I made these on Saturday for breakfast.

Ebelskiver pan.

I used the Ebelskiver chocolate mix from WS.  1 3/4 cup mix, 1 1/3 cup milk, 2 eggs separated, 2 tablespoons melted butter (plus enough to grease the pan).  This makes about 4 batches or 28 pancakes.  Beat the egg whites until they form soft peaks, but not dry.

Mix remaining ingredients until well-mixed and fold in egg whites.

Fold in egg whites. (This makes the pancakes very light and fluffy).

Put 1/4 tsp melted butter into each of the wells in the pan and heat until bubbly.

Heat butter over medium heat until bubbly.

Add 1 tablespoon batter to each well.  Add 2 or 3 chocolate chips to serve as the filling.

Add chocolate chips.

Add tablespoon of batter on top of chocolate chips in each well.

One tablespoon of batter added to top of chocolate chips in each well.

Cook until bottoms are brown, about 3 to 4 minutes.  Using wooden skewers, flip the pancakes over and cook another 3 minutes until dark brown.

Cook until brown.

 Dust with powdered sugar and enjoy.  These would be good for dessert too.  Next time I will make my own batter and will fill with apples or some kind of jam.

Ready to eat. 

Here's a video demonstrating how to make these.

Pumpkin Muffins from a Mix

These cool fall days are perfect for making pumpkin muffins.  I usually make muffins from scratch, but Sunday I decided to make some from a mix, actually I tried two different mixes, Trader Joe's and Williams-Sonoma's.

Williams-Sonoma mix.

Trader Joe's mix.

A year or so ago I bought a set of silicon muffin cups from Williams-Sonoma, and they make it so easy to get the muffin out of the tin.

Williams-Sonoma sili-cups.

Muffins cooling.

I found both mixes to be good, but Trader Joe's is much less expensive than those from Williams-Sonoma (these do have pecans as well which could add a bit to the price). 
Somewhere I saw a suggestion that for Trader Joe's mix to make a healthier muffin add a can of pumpkin to the mix instead of the water, oil and egg. I tried this, but I found those a bit too dense.

Add canned pumpkin to the mix for a healthier muffin.

The "healthier" version, but not quite as tasty for me.

We have new neighbors here on Davis Street that I hadn't met (they moved in while we were traveling) so I took them some muffins as a "welcome to the neighborhood" gift. 

Muffins for the new neighbors.