Monday, August 17, 2009

Wild Blueberry Pancakes with Peach & Brown Sugar Compote




Wild Blueberries are in season in Ontario and we couldn't drive up north last weekend without passing a stand every few miles with a sign touting their Wild Blueberries. Lucky for me the boy loves all things blueberries, so convincing him to stop was quite easy, even though we had already stopped a million times on this one trip. The words that sealed the deal were "I can make a wild blueberry pie." I'm honestly surprised we didn't get into an accident he pulled of the road so quickly. You'll have to stay tuned for the wild blueberry pie later in the week, I promise it's a good one. Today is all about some delicious wild blueberry pancakes. After making my pie there were quite a bit of berries left and though I'm not the biggest pancake person, I suggested making them for breakfast the next morning before we left the cottage. The boy was all about it, so much so that he was willing to get up early so we could have pancakes AND be on the road early enough to miss traffic. Many of you won't know this, but getting him up early on the weekend is a near impossibility, so this was a pretty big deal and let me know I'd better make some amazing pancakes. Before going to bed I scoured the internet for a good recipe that used ingredients we had on hand. I decided on this epicurious recipe and am so glad I did.

Wild Blueberry Buttermilk Pancakes
adapted from epicurious.com

1 1/3 cups all purpose flour
3 tablespoons sugar
2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
3/4 teaspoon salt
1 1/4 cups buttermilk
2 large eggs
2 tablespoons (1/4 stick) unsalted butter, melted, plus more for cooking
2 cups fresh wild blueberries

1. Preheat oven to 250°F. Place baking sheet in oven. Whisk first 4 ingredients in large bowl. Whisk buttermilk, eggs, and 2 tablespoons butter in medium bowl; stir into dry ingredients. Fold in berries.
2. Heat large nonstick griddle or skillet over medium heat; brush with butter. Drop batter by 1/3 cupfuls onto griddle.
3. Cook pancakes until brown, brushing griddle with more butter as needed, about 3 minutes per side. Transfer to sheet in oven to keep warm.

Peach & Brown Sugar Compote

4 Niagara peaches
1/2 cup brown sugar
juice from 1/2 lemon
1/2 tsp cinnamon

1. Bring a pot of water to a boil and prepare an iced water bath. When the water is boil place washed peaches into boiling water for 60 seconds. Remove to the iced water bath until cool enough to handle. skins will slide right off.
2. Slice each peach into 6 wedges and place into a saucepan with brown sugar, lemon juice and cinnamon. Cook over medium heat until peaches begin to soften and a nice golden liquid forms.
3. Using a slotted spoon, remove the peaches from the liquid and reserve. Heat liquid over medium high heat and boil to reduce by about 1/2 to make a syrup.
4. Pour syrup over reserved peaches and serve with blueberry pancakes.


I think I might be sounding like a broken record these days, because as much as I am not a beet person I'm generally not a pancake person either. I'm not sure if it was the delicious wild blueberries or the peach compote topping, but these were fabulous. I also heated up some pure maple syrup to go along with the pancakes, but no one touched it. They were all about the peach compote topping, which was nice as it was something I just threw together since we had a glut of Niagara peaches. Make this breakfast, you can ever switch up the berries in the pancakes or the fruit in the compote, maybe a banana pancake with strawberry compote or peach pancakes with raspberry compote a nod to peach melba. Enjoy!

3 comments:

The Food Librarian said...

Oh! I want! I love blueberries and I love pancakes. Sounds like a perfect match.

Anonymous said...

Your pancakes look delightful! I wish it was Saturday morning now and had time to make them :) Cheers!

Anonymous said...

Your pancakes look delightful! I wish it was Saturday morning now and had time to make them :) Cheers!