My Pancake-Maker

Today I will tell a story about my pancake-maker (I should name it). My pancake maker has heated up a lot of food for me over the past two months, and I honestly don't know what I'd do without it (perhaps use TJ's microwave? You can't toast bread in a microwave, though. Nor can you make tofu with grilled cheese. Or cheese crisps to garnish the cheesy-tofu, as pictured).

My pancake-maker is by Toastmaster, and it's white and has four mini-pancake compartments. There is no on/off switch; literally 15 seconds after I plug it in, the surface is piping hot. I can plop whatever I want onto the pan, lower the lid, and let it sit there for a few minutes (or until stuff starts smoking). Sometimes, I unplug the pancake maker and leave the food there for 10 minutes, because my pancake maker cools down really slowly, so food continues to cook even though there is no electricity powering it anymore.

In the mornings, I slice bagels and let the pancake maker toast them. Other times, I sandwich in tofu meatballs, sandwiches, cookies, eggs, frozen pizza, and pancake batter (obviously). The more adventurous things I've thrown onto my pancake maker include pears, rice (tedious, unless you're cracking an egg onto it. Otherwise, it's a pain scooping the rice out),  spaghetti (bad idea -- maybe farfalle would be better, but thin spaghetti is really irksome to pick up), and collard greens.

I think this is the best thing I've bought for $1. It cranks up the heat, is easy, is fast. It was inexpensive, does everything I want, and is willing to try everything too, and it doesn't matter if it gets dirty or if pancake batter  gets plastered onto the edges. It's is reliable, loyal, and serves me well. It makes me happy. I think that out of context, I could be describing either a significant other or a prostitute.

Pancakes!

I found someone selling a pancake maker for $1 on Craigslist last month in Center City. I lugged that pancake maker from 13th St. all the way back to my apartment. Last Saturday, I dragged the pancake maker all the way back to NJ.

I don't need a pancake maker, obviously. I don't care if my pancakes are rectangular or cloud-shaped, or if they're a tad burnt. I just figured that $1 is a nice price to pay for a non-stick electric saucepan with 4 circular compartments. In college, I can now fry eggs, make pan pizzas, create grilled cheese sandwiches and heat up cookies, all in my room! Which will be very nice.

At the urging of my sister, I made pancakes today. I was going to follow this recipe completely, because I do want to try Drop Scones. Unfortunately, my brother had finished the milk last night. So, here's the modified recipe that worked out alright and yielded dry pancakes. Next time, I will definitely follow the above recipe, but since I appeased my sister, all is well.

Ingredients - 20 pancakes
250 g self raising flour (it has salt included)
25 g sugar
4 eggs
170 g raspberry yoghurt (which includes 26 g sugar)
30 g water
25 g melted butter
vanilla (to appease my sister)
frozen blueberries (to appease my brother)

Look at how pointy the tip of this egg is!

Method
1. Sift dry ingredients.
2. Melt butter and add all wet ingredients.

3. Scoop 1.5 tbsp (2 tbsp is okay. 3 is tolerable.) of batter onto pancake maker and let it cook until it poofs up and looks cooked. This takes about a minute.

Things I'm going to have to change next time to make myself happy:

1. Use 200 ml (whole?) milk, of course, instead of the yoghurt-that-no-one-eats-but-my-mum-buys-it-anyway-due-to-advertising-and-familiarity.

2. No vanilla or blueberries. I want to make perfect plain pancakes before I start with the flavourings.

3. Don't melt the butter. Cut the butter in. I really don't like melting butter. The smell is putrid, it looks like adipose tissue, and I might as well use oil if I want to melt butter! I guess it's just preference.

4. Use less sugar and less butter

5. No water.