Pancakes

This recipe is based on a few others I've read as well as extensive adjustments and experiments. We hope you enjoy!

Ingredients

Prepare a pre-made pancake mix so you save time:
In a large tubberware or other sealable container, add:

• 6 cups of all purpose flour (~800g)
• 1 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 Tablespoon baking powder
• 1 Tablespoon salt

After they are in the container, seal and shake up to mix everything well.

When you're ready to make the pancakes, pull out the mix as well as the following ingredients:

• 2 eggs
• 2 1/3 cups of whole milk (best to use half buttermilk)
• dash of vanilla (2tsp? I never measure)
• 3 ounces of melted butter (6T) 
• 2 Cups of the pancake mix 
• 1 frozen stick of butter

Steps:

1. Place the egg whites in a small mixing bowl and whisk them well. The yolks go into a 8 cup measuring cup. This is a good one. 
2. Whisk the milk and vanilla into the egg whites so they are combined well.
3. Whisk the butter into the yolks. Make sure the butter isn't too hot such that it would cook the yolks.
4. Whisk the milk/white mixture into the yolk/butter. Make sure to whisk these well.
5. Fairly quickly mix in the pancake mix. Whisk it up until mostly smooth. 
6. Add more milk if needed.

The batter shouldn't be runny, but it shouldn't be thick either. The best pancakes are fairly thin, but this takes more time to cook. Thicker pancakes aren't nearly as good. I often need a full 2 1/2 cups of milk or so to get the right consistency. The image above is actually just on the 'too thick' side where the pancakes were good, but just not quite what they could have been.

Cooking:

1. Heat up your griddle fairly hot. You want it almost to the smoke point of the butter, but not quite. A drop of water should dance on the griddle. 
2. Use the frozen stick of butter to grease half of the griddle. Be liberal with the butter here, it is an important medium to cook your pancakes properly.
3. Pour the batter to make pancakes that fill up the buttered half of the griddle. They should be golden brown and crispy within a minute or two if the temp and thickness of batter is correct.
4. Butter the other half of the griddle and flip the pancakes onto that half. 
5. Re-butter the first half and repeat.

When everything is just right with the heat and thickness of the batter, I find that I can butter the griddle and pour four pancakes in the time it takes to cook the other set of four. There might be 20-30 seconds of down time between each set. If your batter is thicker, you'll have to turn down the heat a bit or the insides won't be cooked before the outside starts to burn. Thicker pancakes takes a lot less effort and is harder to really screw up, but they aren't nearly as good.