Ryan Wilson's posterous

Growing up, my favorite weekend breakfast food was the pancake; usually plain, sometimes shaped, always with ample syrup. My brother preferred the waffle but, though he was older and larger, breakfast carbs rotated fairly enough. I say "weekend" because I've never liked frozen store-bought pancakes, which are the only kind regularly feasible before school.

In my teens, a tour de blueberry-pancakes (a.k.a. traveling with my baseball teams) included stops in the East, South, Midwest, Southwest, Northwest, and British Columbia. For a short period, the only thing stopping me from ordering blueberry pancakes every morning was the abomination of blueberry compote atop a normal pancake that many places tried to pawn off.

In college, I entered an oatmeal phase, resulting in hearty pancakes that usually included apple or peach slices and an array of fall spices year round. This period also realized the potential of ricotta, as well as various citrus zest.

Sometime later, a friend introduced me to the wonderful trick of beating the egg whites separately and folding them into the batter. The Pancake attained a new fluffiness.

I've tried many recipes, learning a new pancake method is always worthwhile, but there is a constant annoyance: recipes listed in absolute quantities with indicators such as "makes 4-6". Which is it, four? Or six? And, four to six what? And did you have to use exactly 2 and 1/3 cups flour? Do you have any idea what a pain that will be to scale when I want to make just half? Honestly, who owns a 1/6 measuring cup?

Ideally, I'd solve this by listing ingredients by weight, but alas I have not acquired a kitchen scale (yet).  Also, the egg.  If I were insisting on super precision, I should list the egg white and yolk separately, such as "2T egg white", but that seems a little cumbersome.  

So, I've arrived at the following proportions. The quantities listed make four 6" pancakes, assuming your egg is average size, your flour is loosely packed, and your measurements are non-heaping.  This is based on 1 egg since, being difficult to divide further, that is the smallest that seems reasonable to make, and also because it yields exactly one breakfast for me.  It also scales nicely, as in "use 1 egg for every hungry person."

• Dry: 
  • 1/2c + 2T flour
  • 1/2T sugar
  • 1/2t baking powder
  • 1/4t salt
• Wet:
  • 1 egg yolk
  • 1/2c milk
• Additional:
  • 1/2T melted butter
  • 1 egg white

I've tried whisking the melted butter in with the wet ingredients but, if the milk is cold, the butter will resolidify, which pretty much defeats the purpose of melting it to begin with.  Adding it as specified below prevents that, resulting in a more even distribution.

Thoroughly mix the dry and wet ingredients separately, combine, then add the melted butter and whisk together until smooth.  Beat the egg white until stiff, then fold into the batter.  Behold, the base for just about any pancake awesomeness (excluding ricotta, for which significant modifications are necessary).

Got some awesome 4oz top sirloins from Omaha Steaks for only $3 each.

Reduction in progress:

I got the idea for the bourbon glaze from Foodie Relations (http://www.foodierelations.com). Lisa made a migas with a mushroom gastrique that used the broth from rehydrating mushrooms with cognac, among other things. For this, I pan roasted the steaks, deglazed the pan with bourbon, then added the mushroom broth and reduced.

The appetizers...

 While logged in, there is a "Delete Account" link under "Account Information." If, however, you visit that link and enter your information to have your account removed, it greets you with an error message that you cannot delete your account while signed in. WTF? Why did you let me view the page at all if you weren't going to let me complete the action? Fine then, have it your way. I'll sign out.

 But, oops! When signed out, the link to "Delete Account" under "Account Information" is no longer accessible because clicking "Account Information" takes you to the login page. Ha, clever cycle Hallmark, well played. You cannot delete an account you are signed into, but you cannot find the link to the delete page unless you are signed in.

 So, I signed back in, copied the link to the delete page, signed out, pasted the link into my address bar (half expected the page to be password protected), and successfully deleted my account. Glad to know it was still possible, but it was rather confusing.

 Who knows, maybe there was another link under the FAQ or something.

 But, honestly, who requires you to be logged out to delete an account?