in holland, there are street vendors who sell poffertjes, handmade mini pancakes, which are very puffy and covered with a lot of powder sugar. influenced by the small, bite sized pancakes with the sweet smell of melted butter, i made these mini pancakes at home for breakfast. somehow, i feel that it makes pancakes a special treat if you make them in small pieces.
my dutch hus puts “appelstroop”, apple syrup, on top of the pancakes and indulge himself with it in one go.
appelstroop is typical food from the south of holland, a region called limburg (you can enjoy idyllic landscapes wherever you go. beautiful, but it can be smelly from time to time). it’s basically concentrated apple juice, and is sweet despite the colour (your instant reaction when you see it for the first time is “yucky, it must be so bitter”, just like famous ‘marmite’ paste). it goes amazingly well with gouda cheese, on a slice of grain bread. sometimes they put appelstroop in a sauce for a meat dish to enhance the taste. it is one of the traditional ingredients in the limburg kitchen, where they say the food is exquisite and far better than the rest of holland, because it is closer to france (but they conveniently omit the fact that there is belgium in between) 😉
mini pancakes – dutch style (for 2 people)
ingredients
– 1 egg
– 1 table spoon of sugar
– 1 cup flour (about 140g)
– 1 teaspoon of baking powder
– 3/4 cup of milk (150ml)
– 30g melted butter
– powder sugar for decoration
directions
1. in a medium sized bowl, beat the egg with the sugar
2. sift in 1/3 of flour & the baking powder into the bowl and mix well with a whisk
3. mix in 1/3 of milk and mix again
4. alternate the steps 2 – 3 until the batter is well incorporated
5. mix in the melted butter into the batter
6. put a non-greased large frying pan (you don’t need to grease it because of the melted butter) on the medium heat
7. once the pan is heated up, place it on top of a damp cloth quickly to lower the temperature of its surface
8. place 1+ table spoonful of batter into the pan per pancake. my frying pan takes 3 – 4 pancakes at a time
9. once the bubbles start to appear on the surface of the pancake batter, flip them with a metal spatula
10. cook it for another 10 – 15 seconds or so, and place it onto a large plate
11. repeat the steps 8 – 10 until the batter is fully gone
12. once the pancakes are cooked and nicely decorated on the plate, sprinkle the powder sugar to your liking (i like it a lot!)
eat the pancakes with all the goodies you have in your kitchen – fruit preserves, maple syrup, honey, nutella, etc. and if you happen to find it, appelstroop also. enjoy!
SMALL TOKYO KITCHEN 