Banana Bread Pancakes

When I was in high school, I was not your typical sleeps-til-noon teenager. Nope, not me. I spent every weekday morning getting out of bed at 5am to be able to get up, shower, beautify, collect my things and be out the door on time to catch the bus. So when the weekend came, sleeping in meant 8am.

Now, being an adult, I seem to have found my love for sleep. I usually wake up no earlier than 10am on my days off (unless certain circumstances arise) and sometimes I can even sleep until noon, depending on how late I stayed up baking the night before.

This newly found adoration for my comfy bed and warm blankie sadly interferes with the other love of my life: pancakes for breakfast.

After staring at the clock in disbelief (and other various distractions), I’m usually ready to decide what to make for breakfast around noon. Then I get distracted some more and I either end up skipping breakfast all together or having pancakes at 1:30pm.

It’s National Pancake Day, don’t be like me: start your day off right, enjoy your pancakes for breakfast 🙂

These pancakes taste like you whipped up banana bread dough and accidentally spilled it in your skillet. It tastes exactly like banana bread; but with the whole wheat flour, small amounts of sugar and butter, you can feel good about piling 4 onto your plate. They are fluffy, thick and full of delicious flavor.

Banana Bread Pancakes
adapted from How Sweet Eats

makes 4 pancakes

Ingredients:

2/3 cups whole wheat pastry flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
pinch of salt
3 tablespoons brown sugar
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/8 teaspoon nutmeg
4 tablespoons milk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 large ripe banana, mashed
1 tablespoon butter, melted

Instructions:

In a medium bowl, combine flour, baking powder, sugar, salt, cinnamon, and nutmeg, whisking until combined. In a meauring cup, measure out the milk and vanilla extract and give it a quick stir. Add the wet ingredients to the dry and stir with a rubber spatula. At this point, the mixture will still be dry. Add in mashed banana and mix thoroughly. Add melted butter and stir until batter is somewhat smooth.

Heat a skillet over medium heat. When hot, spritz with non-stick cooking spray and using a 1/3 cup measure, spoon batter into rounds and cook until bubbles form on top and the pancake looks set around the edges – about 2-3 minutes. Flip and cook for a minute or two more. Repeat with remaining batter. Serve hot with butter and syrup, or however you wish.

Note: If you don’t have whole wheat pastry flour, you can use 1 cup of regular whole wheat + 1 cup of all purpose. Or 2 cups of all purpose.

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Silver Palate Banana Bread

Have you ever popped into a bakery or a cafe and been teased and tantilized by what appeared to be a delicious, promising banana nut muffin or bread? And it turned out to be nothing short of… synthetically flavored and over sugared? Don’t feel bad, I fell for it everytime until one day I was just plain grossed out by them. I shunned them and they’ve mocked me eversince.

But no more!! I’d just make it at home… erm… someday!!

And someday has finally arrived! I was tired of waiting and I finally had an excuse to make it. From that moment of clarity I decided then and there that I would choose the recipe carefully, methodically. It had to be perfect: easy on the sugar, gracious amount of banana (not flavoring or extract), dense crumb but still slightly fluffy. I found a winner and I went to work… excitement in tow.

This cake is heaven on a plate! I slightly overbaked it and it was still fluffy and delicious. It wasn’t overloaded with sugar and butter and had a banana flavor to die for!!

The recipe is really simple to bring together and I bet you have most of the ingredients on hand! So what are you waiting for? Grab those ripe bananas and put em to some delicious, good use!

Silver Palate Cookbook Banana Bread: (makes 1 loaf)

8 Tbsp (1 stick) unsalted butter, room temp**
3/4 cup granulated sugar
2 eggs
1 cup unbleached all-purpose flour
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup all purpose flour
3 large ripe bananas, mashed (1 1/4 cups – 1 1/2 cups)
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 cup walnuts or pecans, coarsely chopped

1. Adjust an oven rack to the center position and reheat oven to 350. Grease 9 x 5 x 3 inch loaf pan. (or generously spray Pam for baking in every crevise of your bundt pan/muffin tin.)
2. Spread the nuts on a baking sheet and toast until fragrant, 5 to 10 minutes. Set aside to cool. Chop them coursely when cooled.
3. Sift flour, baking soda, and salt together in a small bowl.
4. Mash bananas with a fork, add vanilla to the banana mixture. Set aside.
5. Cream butter and sugar together until fluffy (in a large bowl, this will be the main mixing bowl). Add eggs, one at a time and beat.
6. Add flour mixture to butter mixture, making sure to mix well.
7. Fold in banana mixture and nuts until combined.
8. Pour into pan. Bake 50-60 min, or until cake tester comes out clean (it took roughly 40 mins in a bundt pan). Cool in pan 10 min, then on rack.

**alternatively, you could melt the butter and go from there to make muffins or a muffin textured banana treat.

Angelic, no?

For more pics click here.