Pancake Perfection on a Sunday Morning

When it comes to whipping up something fast for breakfast, I very rarely have the impulse to make pancakes. Eggs are as extravagant as I get: I drop a clump of butter in the skillet, crack the eggs on the counter and three minutes later I'm in gooey eggy heaven. Yes eggs or maybe oatmeal. Certainly not pancakes. Pancakes would take forever, wouldn't they? Especially pancakes as photogenic as these?

You know looking at that picture there, that may be the single most impressive photograph of something I've made in the history of this website. Maybe it's the natural light. But in terms of wanting to lick the screen, I'm swooning over those dark brown crispy circles framing the tender, cakey pancake beneath. Don't you want to know how I did it? Would you believe it only took 10 minutes? Then click below!

The secret to the success of these pancakes is buttermilk. I had buttermilk in my fridge left over from the orange loaf cake I made the other day. So this morning, when I had only 20 minutes or so before I had to leave to meet Lisa, I typed "buttermilk pancakes" at Epicurious and came upon this recipe.

When I tell you how easy this is you won't believe me. Are you ready?

If you want 4 pancakes like I made, halve the recipe. If you want 8 do it like this. Whisk together the following:

1 cup all-purpose flour

1 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt

1 large egg, lightly beaten

1 cup well-shaken buttermilk

And that's it. (You may say: "How do I halve an egg?" and I simply cracked it into a plastic cup, broke it up a bit with a fork, and then poured half of it into the batter.) This is the batter that will change your life:

You then take a skillet, heat it up on medium, wait a few minutes, get your finger wet under the faucet, flick it on to the skillet and if the water scatters you're ready.

Then you pour in a couple of tsps of vegetable oil, spread it around, and then use a 1/4-cup scoop and fill it halfway, dumping the batter into the skillet like this:

Each pancake should be three-inches wide, according to the recipe.

Let that go for about a minute or until it's bubbly on top or until you lift them and see they're brown on the bottom. Then you flip them:

I had the tiniest bit of flipping trouble (see the batter on top of the 9'oclock pancake?) but it doesn't even matter. Let it go for like 30 seconds or until the bottom's browned (lift and check with the spatula) and you're golden.

Serve on a plate with real maple syrup (I bought mine at the farmer's market) and this is a breakfast that makes you want to get up early on a regular basis. I even said aloud (and this is true, I'm not making this up): "These pancakes are awesome." It just came out of me, like my mouth just spoke those words and my brain was like: "Whoah, mouth, where did that come from?"

It came from a place of utter satisfaction. These pancakes, for lack of a better expression, rock.*

[*And, note: to further qualify the wonderfulness of these pancakes, I don't even like pancakes! I've always been a waffle person. But I'll waffle no longer when it comes to making breakfast!**]

[**That was cheesy.***]

[***No, it was punny.****]

[****Well punny is cheesy.*****]

[*****Shut up.]