Amazing German Pancake!

This amazing German pancake is an awesome dish to make for your holiday guests! It’s festive and quite spectacular when your guests see how your pancake has puffed to enormous heights when you take it out of the oven. Not only does it make for a wonderful presentation but it’s made with little effort and can be served for breakfast or as a dessert!

A German pancake is really a giant popover. “Dutch baby” is another name for this pancake and rumor has it that the reason behind this name came about when a chef’s young child couldn’t pronounce the German word for German, “Deutsche”. Supposedly, this mis-pronunciation lead German Pancakes to the alternative name “Dutch Babies”. A couple other names that this German pancake has been called are “Dutch puff” and “Bismark”.

My kids get very excited for that moment when this amazing German pancake comes out of the oven! It has a bit of a custard like texture inside yet very light. We love eating these pancakes and have come to the conclusion that they taste like something in between a pancake, french toast and a crêpe!

My Vermont friends turned me on to this recipe years ago and I have been making them ever since. It’s fun for me to play around with recipes and see what works best so to this recipe I have added another egg, some vanilla and a little cinnamon. You can add grated nutmeg instead if you prefer. Originally, these homemade pancakes were served with lemon and confectioners sugar. I like to served them with confectioners sugar, real maple syrup, fresh blue berries and a dollop of my favorite “Wild Blueberry Preserves” by Bonne Maman, a product of France (sold right in our local market at Stop and Shop). German pancakes are so easy to make, taking on the same amount of time as making ordinary pancakes. The wonderful thing here is you are not glued to the stove pouring batter every few minutes.

Using cast iron is the way to go here because it holds in the heat evenly distributing it throughout the pan but I have made them in other oven proof pans and it comes out great. Some recipes have you pre-heating the pan in the oven, pulling out the rack, pouring in the batter, then pushing the rack back into the oven and in my opinion, this is a disaster waiting to happen since the batter can easily swoosh over the sides causing the oven to smoke ! The easiest way to start these homemade German pancakes is heat the pan in the oven then add butter and whisked, warm batter. The finished product will make you will feel like a french pastry chef all day. This could also make for a great dessert to an impressive dinner with entrees like turkey stuffed peppers, pulled beef tacos & mango salsa or yogurt-chicken kabobs & tzatziki. Enjoy!

   

  

   

Ingredients for Traditional German Pancake:

• 5 extra LG eggs ROOM temperature eggs (place eggs in a bowl of warm water for 20 minutes or leave on counter for 1 hr)
• 1 cup Milk – WARM the milk (not hot)
• 1 cup all purpose flour
• 1/2 Tsp. salt
• 1/4 Tsp cinnamon
• 1 Tsp. vanilla
• 2 Tbsp melted butter (warm)
• 3 Tbsp butter – cut up to add to pan before you pour in batter

Ingredients for savory German Pancake:

• 5 extra LG eggs (or 6 large) ROOM TEMP.
• 1 cup Milk – WARM
• 1 cup all purpose flour
• 1/2 Tsp. salt
• 1/2 cup swiss cheese OR cheddar
• 1/2 cup thin diced ham OR sauteed mushrooms
• 1/3 cup green onion OR sauteed sweet onion
• NOTE: If you are going the cheddar, sauteed mushroom & onion route add 1 cup fresh baby spinach too!
• 3 Tbsp butter  -cut up into 4 Tbsp (1/2 stick) COLD

Directions:  

1. Pre-heat oven to 425º
2. Add the cast iron pan to the oven while pre-heating
3. Whisk milk, vanilla, salt and flour first in a large bowl
4. Then whisk in 1 egg at a time just until combined
5. Whisk in melted butter, final mix of batter should be WARM not cold (you can microwave for 10 seconds at a time and stir in between to get to WARM temperature if need be, DO NOT go longer then 10 seconds at a time in the microwave or batter will cook
6. Take heated pan out of the pre-heated oven and add in 3 tbsp butter, let melt
7. Once the butter is melted pour in WARM batter (If making a savory pancake add veggies and cheese now on top of the poured batter)
8. NOTE: A savory pancake or blueberry pancake will not puff as much a plain German pancake!
9. Bake for 21 minutes until puffed
10. Remove from oven and transfer to a plate or cutting board with a spatula and sprinkle with confectioners sugar.
11. Slice into wedges and serve with maple syrup, warm fresh strawberry jam/sauce (Recipe BELOW) and whipped cream! …mmm!

Ingrediesnts and Directions for EASY STRAWBERRY JAM/SAUCE:

• 1 lb. hulled and chopped fresh stawberries
• 1 cup white sugar
• 1/4 cup fresh sqeezed lemon juice

1. Finely dice strawberries and add to a wide 8″ sauce pan with 1 cup sugar and lemon juice
2. Over med/high heat bring to a rolling simmer
3. Keep an eye on the mixture, keep simmering for 15 min. – make sure it doesn’t boil over
4. Skim off white foam that accumulates around the edges while simmering as this will make the jam cloudy (its just air bubbles that form in the jamming process)
5. Remove from heat and serve warm with German pancake
6. Jar the remaining strawberry sauce and refrigerate as it will thicken into a jam as it cools! It will stay good for 2 weeks in the frig.