Saturday Morning Rituals and New Additions

Do you have any family traditions or rituals? Do you always eat certain meals together as a family? Growing up, Sunday dinner was always eaten at the table together (although most of our dinners were anyways) and then we played board games afterwards (my favorite being Pay Day). Another one would be Sunday mornings (Saturday we would go to church early so there was never much time) my dad would make alphabet pancakes for breakfast. The batter was thinner, and he would make the pancakes into the shapes of letters. One time, he got extra fancy and he wrote out, in cursive, each my name and my brothers name. Now that is what I call a personalized breakfast! I'll never forget that, it's a great memory of my dad showing his kids how special they were. I had yet to make these pancakes but maybe one weekend I will make some alphabet ones for my husband :)

Since C and I both work full time and have tons to do in the evenings, we only really get to eat late dinners together, if we're both home late. Breakfast, he often eats in his van on the way to work, and I always eat at my desk. Saturdays though are special. While we often have to get up early if workers are coming over or if we have errands to run, we really try and do a special breakfast together. Sometimes C would get up first and make pancakes and eggs for us while I got myself ready. This Saturday morning, I got up first and let him sleep in longer. I knew how exhausted he was from the week and his longer hours so I decided that big puffy pancakes would be just the ticket. There's nothing like slowly opening your eyes from a hazy slumber and smelling the sweet warm wafting aroma of pancakes coming from the kitchen.

I had leftover pumpkin that I was going to make into soup, but decided that since I also had 1/3 of a banana left from the cheesecake, that I would just mash those together and make pumpkin banana pancakes.

Pancake batter

Pancakes from scratch are super easy to make. Each recipe is a little different but it's all generally the same. Like muffins, the dry ingredients get mixed together separately from the wet. So, in one bowl, milk, oil, pumpkin and banana, vanilla, an egg, and vinegar. I added the spices to this bowl too, to really whisk them up. Cinnamon, ginger, and allspice.

In the dry bowl, I added whole wheat flour, baking powder, baking soda, brown sugar, and a pinch of salt. The pinch of salt really brings flavours forward. The vinegar that was added to the wet ingredients does 2 things. One, it sours the milk if you allow it to stand, which I did. Basically, this produces a buttermilk. If a recipe ever calls for buttermilk and you don't have any, you can make it yourself by adding an acid to milk. So, if you need 1 cup of buttermilk, add 1 Tbsp of vinegar or lemon juice to a 1 cup liquid measuring cup, top to the 1 cup line with milk, and then let stand for about 10 minutes until curdled. Mix and use as buttermilk. Secondly, the acid reacts with the baking powder to create fluffy, puffy pancakes. Remember making volcanoes in the sink using vinegar and baking soda? same idea.

When adding the wet and the dry ingredients together, mix them with a whisk until just moist. Let the batter stand for about 5 minutes.

Pancakes cooking, bubbles beginning to form

One of the tricks of pancakes, is knowing when to flip them. First, you need a great pancake cooking surface. I love griddles and we have one, but it's also on the very top of the pantry so I opted for a non-stick pan that my grandma Babcia had given to me. This pan works great since the surface is flat. A well-seasoned cast iron pan brushed with butter or oil would work well too. Ladle the batter carefully into the pan. You're trying to just scoop up enough for a serving (I use a full ladle-full since I know that each scoop is 1/2 cup so I can keep my pancake sizes consistent). Also, be gentle with the batter since it should feel like air has been whipped into it from the acid neutralizing process when the liquids were added to the dry ingredients. You want that air to stay put while the batter cooks so your pancakes puff up.

How do you know when to flip them? The element heat should be at about medium to medium-low heat, and once bubbles start to form on the pancakes, and the edges look firm, then, you flip.

Pumpkin Banana Spice Pancakes

Your end product should look like this if you've done everything correctly. The pancakes should pop up as they cook, looking like french macaroons. Let them cook for about a minute or less, then serve and enjoy hot!

Home Outfitters was having their "Make Your Own Sale" Sale. You can print from online a 20% off coupon, good for any regular priced item in the store. I printed 4 of these, did 4 separate transactions, and now have all of the small appliances that we were missing or were getting very very old.

A robin's egg blue Cuisinart blender, on sale for 89.99, plus I still received my 20% off, and I got this baby for 50$ (I still put the dollar sign on the "french side") including tax! This picture does not do the colour justice. I plan to make smoothies with this baby!

New Cuisinart Blender

 Next on the list was a hand mixer and an immersion blender. Our hand mixer really does work fine, but hey, I liked the colours of these ones. They also came in orange, purple, and robin's egg blue. They were on for 40$, plus 25% off for each of these items. Our immersion blender we use all the time for soups and the base of ours was plastic and had now cracked. So, here is its beautiful replacement! 40$, plus 25% off. By the way, all of our old items were donated to the Salvation Army, which is what we do with most of our old working items unless we give them to friends who want/need them. Friend swaps are the best! I'm looking for good fiction books, in case anyone is looking to get rid of old stuff. Clothes, bags and shoes as well.

Cuisinart does it right in lime green and robin's egg blue small appliances

 Probably the best purchase of the day was this toasted. For the past 6 years, I had been using my grandma nan's old toaster. Again, the toaster worked fine, but it left crumbs everywhere each time it was used, and I had always wanted a 4 slicer, especially since getting married. I've been looking online at toasters and haven't had much luck finding anything. The closest I came was one I saw in a Style At Home magazine which was robin's egg blue and very retro looking but it could only be found in the UK. I was not desperate enough to fly a toaster overseas, nor were the reviews on it good enough to justtify such an endeavor. By chance, I saw this baby in Home Outfitters while I was trying to find their toaster section. Bright candy apple red, retro look, like an old 50s diner radio mixed with the shiny chromed bumpers from the same area. Hmm, 130$. For a toaster. Damn. But, for 20% off, I ended up paying 80$ for this beauty.

A Beauty of a Toaster! Still needs a name...

So, for under 200$, our old appliances were said goodbye to, and I am so happy with the new items. Yes, we didn't NEED them, and could have made due until the old ones really died, but I had been looking at this stuff for ages and the opportunity was right. Don't judge, lol. I am going to enjoy these babies for a long time!