Coming from a family of many different races and ethnicities I grew up learning a lot about the Kazakh, Greek, Russian, Armenian, German, Korean, Jewish and Ukrainian cuisine, to mention only a few. Korean glass noodle salad, Russian black bread, Armenian kefir and Kazakh syrup sweets - as a child, I had all of this together (Goodness, I'll never forget the good old days...) If you are also of a mixed family background you'll probably know what I'm talking about. But anyway, I'm straying from the subject, let's get back to the main story I wanted to talk about: yeasted apple pancakes. As a child, I ate a lot of pancakes. No matter if those were Russian or German or Greek pancakes, no matter if they were made with buttermilk, yeast or whole wheat flour, no matter if I added honey or jam or cream cheese on top - I've tried endlessly many different kinds of pancakes. And, honestly, I still haven't fallen out of love with pancakes. They're always great, no matter what. That's why I wanted to share an amazingly delicious pancake recipe with you which uses yeast for the batter, apple slices for the top and which is perfect for a warm, fruity and sweet breakfast meal. Trust me. These. Are. Simply. Good.
Yeasted Apple Pancakes
250gm flour (I was using regular white flour, use whole wheat flour if you prefer to live on the healthy side of life)
1 tsp salt
1 tsp cinnamon
3 Tabsp sugar
20gm fresh yeast, in crumbles or small pieces
250gm warm milk
3 Tabsp melted butter or margarine
3 eggs
2 apples, in thick slices
some butter for frying
In a large glass bowl, combine flour, salt and cinnamon and mix well. Slightly press in the top of the flour mixture using your fingers to make sort of a pit or deepening, in which you have to place the crumbled yeast, sugar, melted butter and milk. Gently stir, just until a bit combined and let sit for a few minutes until the yeast mixture on top of the dry mixture starts to get light and foamy. Add eggs and start beating the batter using a hand mixer on high speed until everything is well incorporated. Cover the bowl with a kitchen towel or a plastic wrap and let sit at a very warm place for about 40 - 60 minutes until the batter has risen a little bit. Now make the pancakes: melt some butter in a frying pan at medium heat, drop about 2 - 3 tablespoons of batter in the pan and place one apple slice on top of the pancake. Fry on both sides at medium heat for about 3 minutes until golden brown. Continue until batter and apple slices are used up.
Serve while still warm adding some liquid honey or maple syrup on top of the pancakes.
