FoodPoint

6.01 Buckwheat Pancakes w/ Wildberry Syrup - Breakfast & Brunch - Low-Fuss

What better place to start the new season than with breakfast? I know some of you may be dubious as to how exactly this fits into a "healthy" season, but using the right ingredients it's actually not as bad as you'd think. Which brings me to the stats for this dish:

Recipe makes 4 serves
417 calories (1745 kilojoules) per serve
7.75 grams of fat per serve
(*when made with Erythritol)

See, not so bad, right? It's also worth adding that the recipe is completely gluten free with no added sugar. For those of you wondering about all the carbs, well, this is a breakfast dish. If you're going to have a carb-heavy meal it's best to do it at the beginning of the day so you have plenty of time to burn it off.

PART A - WILDBERRY SYRUP

So the "wildberry" part of the title may be a bit of a misnomer as I'm fairly sure almost none of the berries you buy commercially are actually wild-picked anymore, but everyone else says it, so...

Ingredients:
200g mixed berries
3/4 cup maple flavoured syrup

You can use fresh or frozen berries - obviously fresh would be better - and whatever combination you prefer. I use equal parts raspberry (for tartness and colour), blackberry (for colour and texture) and blueberry (for sweetness).

While I'd usually go out of my way to use pure maple syrup in my food, in this case the maple flavoured syrup better suits the "healthy" idea, having a mind-boggling SEVEN TIMES LESS calories than pure maple syrup. While some people may have issues with the sweeteners used, you can't really argue with that statistic. It may vary from brand to brand, but if you're confused just have a quick look at the nutritional values on the bottle.

Method:

1. Place the berries and syrup into a saucepan, stir together and place over a medium heat.

2. Once it starts to simmer, let it bubble away for 5-10 minutes, stirring occasionally, until the berries begin to break down and release their juices.

3. Turn off the heat and allow to cool for around 15 minutes before serving. (Because putting boiling syrups into your mouth is never a good idea, plus this gives you time to make the pancakes!)

PART B - BUCKWHEAT PANCAKES

As mentioned above, these are both gluten free and sugar free. It turns out that "buckwheat" is also a misnomer as it isn't a type of wheat at all! This recipe is just one big stack of contradictions... although they are tasty contradictions.

Ingredients:
1 1/2 cups buckwheat flour
1/2 cup quinoa flakes
1/3 cup natural sweetner (such as xylitol, stevia, erythritol, etc.)
400ml buttermilk
2 eggs
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
1 tsp vanilla extract or paste
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp vegetable oil (for frying)

The quinoa flakes are really just there to add a bit of body to the pancakes so you feel full. If you can't find them then you can replace this with the same amount of quick-oats instead, however this stops the recipe from being gluten free.

Most people are already familiar with stevia, but I've recently discovered xylitol and erythritol which are made from sugar alcohols - which are neither sugar NOR alcoholic, just to continue the theme I seem to have going here - and are therefore considered natural. Xylitol has around half the calories of sugar but erythritol, like stevia, has basically no calories at all (or at least very few). If you're unsure about which to use, I suggest you do a bit of research to see the pros and cons of each.

Method:

1. Place the buckwheat, quinoa (or oats), sweetener,  baking powder, bicarb and salt into a large jug (or a bowl with a pouring lip) and mix until evenly dispersed.

2. In another jug, place the buttermilk, eggs and vanilla and whisk together until combined.

3. Pour the buttermilk mixture into the buckwheat mixture and whisk until you have a fairly smooth batter. (There will be some lumpiness caused by the quinoa flakes or oats, but that's fine.)

4. Heat a pan over medium-high heat, then add the cooking oil and use some kitchen towel to wipe it around the pan to make a thin coating.

5. Pour out blobs of batter approx. 7cm (2.5 in) wide, taking care not to overcrowd the pan.

6. Fry for 1 and a half to 2 minutes before flipping. (Bubbles will begin to apear on the top of the pancakes within the first minute, but you should wait until the outer edges of the pancakes are slightly set before attempting to flip them over. People tend to get a bit anxious which is the real reason why the first batch of pancakes is never quite right.)

7. Fry for a further minute or so on the other side before removing from the pan.

8. Serve warm with syrup.

Makes 12 (serving size is 3 pancakes plus 1/4 of the wildberry syrup).

A video of these recipes is also available at https://youtu.be/nyrTycqZCSs.