...Now just to test the waters I've decided to start with something almost everybody should be able to agree with...Pancakes aahh those flat and perfectly round steaming stacks of deliciousness, with a little melted butter on the top drizzlled with maple syrup it looks like a volcanic eruption of love...For those twisted ones out there you can add some grated ube to your batter and get the same thing except in PURPLE! Before I get too crazy though here is the main recipe:
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 cups buttermilk
1 egg, lightly beaten
or
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 cups buttermilk
1 egg, lightly beaten
1 cup grated ube
The Blog I'm stealing this from just happens to be a personal favourite called Burnt Lumpia. I found the site from googling recipes with ube and the recipe for pancakes was one of the first ones I tried from it. Just to enlighten you on my thinking process when picking out recipes I usually go for things less conventional. It's kind of a backwards way of starting out and if you have just started cooking I would recommend going a more simpler route. Also I love going out shopping for weird ingredients I've never used before so if you're the lazy type who just wants to get down to eating you can skip the ube and just make the plain ol' pancakes (which are outstanding in their own right). For those daring enough and willing to take the time to actually hunt down for ingredients follow onward.
Really the only thing that makes this recipe weird but alone the presence of yam in a pancake and purple yam for that matter...well that's probably weird enough for any of us. Now finding this frozen package of grated ube (which is what you'll be using unless you live in the Philippines and can get your hands on the fresh stuff) was really not that hard. First stop is a trip to the local china town these packages should be available in most chinese food markets...in the frozen section. Now for those of you who've no idea what a chinese food market is whoo, well that is an adventure all itself my friend and to some the poignant smell of fish and produce alone will be enough to deter you from tracking this ube down. Have fun.
Once you've got your ube your going to have to thaw it so plan ahead, if you're going to make the pancakes for breakfast like a 'normal' person cut off the plastic and leave the frozen ube in a bowl overnight. Now Burnt Lumpia does a pretty good job of illustrating the process but if your a noobie like I was, pretty much working with anything mushy and soft and foriegn (like how the ube is when thawed) is intimidating. One of the problems I have/had with food blogs (not so much a problem anymore for obvious reasons) is that they assume readers have a basic knowledge of how to deal with ingredients and usually that basic knowledge is more advanced then what someone like me would know. This was a problem I had when working with specifically frozen ube for the first time, It was too moist and mushy and when I mixed it in a cake batter it didn't get ruined per se but it could have turned out better. So if you get this problem the way I dealt with it was I spread out the mushy ube on a flat surface and just gently began patting it down with a paper towel to soak up some moisture. There, proabably more effective methods out there but I hope that helps.
This is the part where I had to stray from the directions a little bit because somehow my family does not own a griddle. Nope, instead I used a large frying pan which is probably the more conventional way of doing it anyhow. The first ever time I had tried frying some pancakes was pretty disastrous. It may have been due in part that it was a thicker batter then usual (It had mashed bananas and toasted walnuts) and it was probably all due to the fact that I had the heat on high the entire time. The problem I had then was as soon the batter hit the pan it got burned on one side and was still too moist on the top to flip over without making a total mess. Ofcourse being the idiot that I am I could not make the connection that it was due to the high heat. So I would repeatedly drop the batter on the pan and go, 'Oh shit it's burning, gotta flip it!' then try flipping it and have half of it stuck to the pan and the other half folded onto itself and end up with something that more resembled a rotten banana peel on the floor then a pancake. Illustrating how most knowledge in the kitchen is gained friends, through trial and error. With this experience I managed to fry the ube pancakes pretty painlessly. Firstly by keeping the heat on medium and also greasing the pan more to prevent stickage. I also tried flipping the pancake in the air for the first time...and the last time. Flipping tricks aside (I'll reserve the flip tricks for playing Skate 2) the end result was a pretty cool looking rather lavender tinted pancakes. In short it was quite successful. Now was the fateful taste test, I dread this moment as
fun had making it but I would be lying to you if I said whether it tasted good or not didn't matter to me. My verdict?
*Drumroll* It tasted.........liiiiike..........a pancake..........
Alas I was expecting as much. The pancakes were still pancakes and they tasted like pancakes, and pancakes that taste like pancakes are fucking awesome buuuut they weren't just plain 'ol pancakes, they were purple! Thus they should taste different, like something purple...like ube. Fail. Admittedly this is not the first time I have attempted making an ube recipe and have the end product without the ube flavor. I'm not sure what is at fault it may be that the packages I bought were old and lost flavor or somewhere I screwed up ( Always a possibility with me). Still I can't say I'm mad since they definitely looked the part, also my cousins practically inhaled the things. After I made this batch and had the positive feedback from the cousins(who are 5 and 6 years old...they approve by eating everything) I made another batch with the same recipe minus the ube and it DID taste different, in fact I preferred the ube version. However for a next time I'll probably add a little ube extract to get more flavor out. In the end this is an excellent recipe for pancakes and if you're gonna make the ube version then who knows maybe you can do it better then me. So I guess that's it for this blog...It ended up being way longer then I had intended but it was fun. Please leave comments! :) and happy cooking.
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