Pancake

Update:This actually worked out really well. I set out some marinara sauce and my grandparents treated them like meaty cheese sticks. With two pounds of minced (ground) veal and a pound of the Gouda, i was able to make 34 (albeit, the last one or two weren't all that thick in comparison). I tried one myself, extremely tasty. I don't know what else to say about it, to be honest. It's a really good recipe - thanks again, Casa-rama.

I'm going to go ahead and try this recipe. The only difference, is that I'm going to have to substitute the ground veal with ground beef (minced beef). Although, I'll call around to the few butchers in the area to see if I can find any veal before breaking down and changing the recipe (since this sounds best for veal v.s. beef). It'd end up being the first thing I really get to use the deep fryer for too. ;o

Gnomophobia : This is the fear of garden gnomes. I don't even want to see this, it's so terrifying. I keep imagining Casa running after me with a dunce hat and screaming "Pizzzzzzzzaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa"..

Yeah, leave it to the old %#Extreme\bTeam and %#Extreme\bTeam\bTest\bRoom to bring most of the Sysops around. DocSuess, Kat, and Linda always came in from time to time to pester us all. Everybody from Casa to Robert to the m0nk3y to Sie/Tek/etc.. ;o

Happy International Pancake Day! This is the day that all should be making some pancakes or crepes. Ignore the waffles, they don't exist (simply because they're not as cool as pancakes, sorry to say). Right! I've posted some recipes for you to try if you're in the mood to get a little creative. However, no fret, I wouldn't blame you for using some Bisquik or Aunt Jemima instant-mix. Just make yourself a pancake or two, no matter how big, thin, small, fluffy they are. ~

Baked Potato Filling -- USE BASIC CREPE RECIPE SEEN ABOVE -- Ingredients: Baked Potato (leftovers are PERFECT for this recipe, but you're not using the skin) Salt and Pepper (to taste) Any other herbs or spices you generally enjoy in a baked potato (also, to taste) Your favourite kind of cheese (I personally go for cheddar or mozzarella) Green peas Bell peppers, chopped Red onion, chopped ... basically ANYTHING YOU'D LIKE ON A BAKED POTATO! That's the whole point of this filling is to make a crepe filled with your favourite kind of baked potato. While making your crepe (be careful and pay attention to it), you can start with the ingredients. Mush up the baked potato (not the skin!) and spice it to your taste (pepper, salt, paprika, onion salt.. whatever). Personally, I like to take the chopped onion, peas, and bell pepper and cook them off into a separate pan. Once your crepe is half done, you should then (instead of flipping it), fill it with the ingredients you've chosen (minus cheese and sour cream!). You'll want to add the cheese on the side facing up while it's cooking. Sour cream comes after you plate it (unless you want a heck of a mess).

Simple Dinner Crepe Recipe Ingredients: 1 cup of All-Purpose Flour (or whole wheat flour if you're in that mood) 1/4 teaspoon of salt 1 1/2 to 1 3/4 cup of water 1 egg Mix all of the ingredients together into a medium-sized bowl. It's going to be thinner than that of pancake batter. You can use a food processor or use a wand to mix the ingredients. Just remember the most important rule with crepes: THERE SHOULD BE NO LUMPS WHATSOEVER INTO THE BATTER! With pancake batter, it's a bit more forgiving if you have a few lumps .. crepes are NOT like that. These are very, very thin. One lump can be massive due to this. Pre-heat your pan on medium heat. Then raise it up into the air (by its handle, obviously) and pour the batter in. Once again 1/4 cup of batter is just right. While you're pouring, move the pan so that the batter moves to all sides of the pan - filling its shape as much as you can (but keeping it thin!). When the edges begin to peel away from the pan or they're slightly golden (which ever comes first), use a spatula to loosen it up and flip it over. This side should cook -much- faster. Remove from the pan and fill with some of the following fillings (I will label them as fillings, instead of recipes).

Creamy Chicken Crepes Ingredients Crepe Ingredients - 1 cup of flour 1 1/4 cups of milk 1 egg 1 egg yolk A pinch of salt Filling ingredients - 600g (about 21oz) of chicken tenderloins, chopped into small pieces 300g (about 10oz) of bacon, chopped into small pieces 1 onion, chopped 190g (6oz) of WET (in a can) champignon (or your favourite type) of mushrooms 2 tablespoons of sour cream To make the crepes, you should mix all ingredients and let it sit for about 30-40 minutes. Do not use the mix before it has sit for this time. It allows it to 'air' itself out and make it easier to make a thin crepe (unlike regular pancakes, they're not thick and fluffy). As usual, pour 1/4 cup of the batter into a round pan. Treat it similar to a regular pancake, as in allowing it to cook before flipping. KEEP IT AS THIN AS YOU CAN POSSIBLY CAN! For the filling, you're going to have to brown the chicken into another pan. Add in the bacon pieces and the chopped onion and let it cook until it's all golden brown. Reduce this until all the ingredients are back to being as dry as they can. Put ingredients into a bowl, put in the 2 tablespoons of sour cream and mix well. Add only about 2 tablespoons onto the crepe (once you've taken it out of the pan!) and roll it. And dig in!

Next up are some crepes. I know that, for Americans, crepes aren't very common compared to that of other countries (especially Europe/UK). However, one of the most unique things about crepes is that they turn the process of pancakes into something even MORE flexible. While regular, fluffy pancakes are the "bees knees" (ehe..), crepes are basically their cousin from a parallel dimension that came here to show us what we're missing out on. In other words, you can stuff crepes with just about anything and still make it work. So here are some crepe recipes (following this post) that you can always experiment with. All I have tried, most (if not all) are not my own. However, I refuse to put up a recipe that I haven't personally performed and tasted. Happy Pancake Day to everybody. Try to find the time to make yourself something you find in this thread on February 21st of every year. It's just one of those things that makes the holiday that much more special. I mean come on, it's not THAT hard to make a pancake..

Regular Pancake Recipe Ingredients 1 1/2 cups of All-Purpose Flour 3 1/2 teaspoons of Baking Powder 1 teaspoon of Salt 1 tablespoon of Sugar 1 1/4 cup of Milk 1 egg 3 tablespoons of Butter (or Margarine), melted Optional Ingredients: 1 teaspoon of Vanilla flavouring 1 half teaspoon of cinnamon (or just a "dash") 1 half teaspoon of nutmeg (or just a "dash") Sift together the dry ingredients (flour, powder, salt, sugar - and optionally, cinnamon and nutmeg) into one bowl. Make a well in the centre of the dry ingredients and pour in all of the wet ingredients (milk, egg, melted butter - optionally, vanilla flavouring). From here, mix until smooth. I highly recommend trying to pour 1/4 cup portions into your griddle/skillet/frying pan for each pancake to make it even and happy. This is my most common base pancake recipe, no matter what else I add - this is the essential 90% of the time.

Yoghurt Pancakes Ingredients: 2 cups of All-Purpose Flour 2 Tablespoons of Sugar (opt out if you're using any flavoured yoghurts!) 2 teaspoons of Baking Powder 1 teaspoon of Baking Soda 2 eggs, lightly beaten 2 cups of yoghurt (plain or flavoured - 16 ounces) 1/4 cup of water Special Ingredients: Semi-Sweet Chocolate Chips, Dried Fruit, or whatever you wish.. In a bowl, mix together the dry ingredients (flour, baking powder, baking soda, and sugar). In a separate bowl, whisk the two eggs and follow with mixing the wet ingredients (yoghurt and water). Stir the wet ingredients into the dry ones. From here, it should be straight-forward. If you want to be specific, try pouring in 1/4th cup intervals into your skillet or frying pan. To add your "special ingredients", simply sprinkle them onto the pancake while it's cooking. Only flip it over once you begin to see bubbling on the top. If you're wondering why I would even -try- making some type of yoghurt pancake, it's because I've been chronically obsessed with yoghurt in general lately (past month or so). Therefore, it was a must-try. - Endae/David

As one that many consider around here as a "chef" of sorts, I must bring it to everybody's attention that February 21st is considered International Pancake Day. So what I want you to do is post your favourite pancake or crepe recipes. I'm probably going to be flooding the hell out of this thread with various pancake recipes that I've come to enjoy and love. Why am I so obsessed with pancakes, you ask? It's because, personally, it was one of the first things that I learned how to make properly. On a more important perspective about pancakes, they bring joy to everybody of all ages. If an 86 year old man can enjoy pancakes for breakfast, anybody can. So you can look back in the days where your mum and dad would make you pancakes, or you can even remember the moments that you've felt crappy and made your own pancakes - just remember the awesomeness of the incredible pancake. So away we go... ~

This is something I ended up making today for the grandparents. Koach requested it, so must be done! I kid, but you know what I mean.. ~ e Ingredients 1 cup of Sugar 1/2 cup butter or margarine 2 eggs slightly beaten 3 tablespoons of sour cream 1 teaspoon of baking soda 1/4 teaspoon of salt 2 cups of flour 1/2 cup of chopped nuts (optional, any kind you prefer) 2 bananas mashed (with fork, or with hands, or spoon, or .. whatever you wish, really- just MASH 'em) Mix ingredients as listed. Put into a bread pan, greased and floured. Bale at 350

This recipe is rather complicated, even though it appears remarkably simple. This is a combination of several recipes, actually. The original concept was to make a decent Chinese sponge cake (which went out of control when I was being 'showy' for an ex-girlfriend.. rofl). Alright, here we go... First we're going to start with the sponge cake itself. Chinese Sponge Cake 1 1/2 cup cake flour, sifted 9 eggs, separated 1/2 tsp. cream of tartar 1/2 tsp. baking powder 1 cup of sugar 1/2 cup of water 1/4 cup of oil (vegetable, preferably - but, you can use canola and such) 1 tsp of vanilla flavouring (again, preferably - real flavouring, but imitation should suffice too) Beat the egg whites until foamy. Add the 1/2 teaspoon of cream of tartar. Then start beating again until it's stiff (you'll notice the difference). Sift together the flour, baking powder, and sugar. Add to egg yolks, add the water, oil, and vanilla. Beat until creamy. Pour this mixture over the egg whites gently and fold until blended. (If you do not try to do this carefully it won't get the right texture in the end!) In my version of this cake, I used a 2x2 (inch) entremet ring at 350F for 15-20 minute (please keep an eye on it! Just make sure it's golden brown and cooked through) The next part of the cake is a bit tricky. It's mango pudding. Yeah, it's a bit trippy. I ended up making way, way more than I needed for the cake. But it was so damn good that it didn't matter. I'm going to give you the full recipe that I used for a mango pudding. Mango Pudding (PREPARE THIS FIRST!) 2 tablespoons of unflavoured gelatin 3/4 cup of sugar 1 cup of hot water 3 cups of pureed fresh (hopefully) mangoes 1 cup of 2% evaporated milk 8 ice cubes Add gelatin and sugar to the hot water, mix until it all dissolves and smooth. In a separate bowl, mix the mango puree, ice cubes, and evaporated milk. Pour the gelatin mix into the mango mix, Stir. Keep stirring until those ice cubes are completely melted. Pour mixture into a mold (or a 'presentable bowl' if you're going to share some with friends outside of the cake). Let it chill for about 3 hours. The mango pudding is going to be a THIN LAYER on the cake. I mean, really thin. In fact, you shouldn't really use more than a teaspoon or two. You can go a LITTLE crazy by adding an extra teaspoon, but we've still got some other goodies to put on this cake. Now, we're going to have to whip up some fresh cream to use as our "frosting". I'm going to post a totally separate topic about fresh cream.. since it's so useful for cakes and desserts as a whole. However, whip your fresh cream and carefully, evenly, delicately spread it over top of the mango pudding that you've just laid on top of the cake. The smoother you can get this, the better. Why are you being obsessive with the cream? Because you're still not done. The rest isn't a "recipe" but very delicate technique. You want to take a mango and very very thinly make strips that will go over the fresh cream. From here, it's all creative license. If you've seen my cake (i'll find a picture later), you'll see some fancy little cups I made from thin mango slices that cup around grapes. If you have any melon bits, I would use them over grapes. Viola.

Great presentation, Charles. It's something that hasn't always been my forte - but you've outdone yourself. Sounds pretty good, may have to give this a try when the local oysters come into season (as well as a good attempt at going raw again).

I'm an INTJ. Always have been. I was posting about this a long while back when Shannon suggested a book outlining compatibility between types and all that fun stuff. It was rather frightening how accurate it could be at times.

I actually have a hat similar to this, since you can buy them. But, I think the tutorial is awesome since you can decide what headphones to use (rather than the cheap ones the one I bought have). Thanks.

This is a bit of a unique recipe that I've found in an old cookbook. It seemed somewhat interesting to me, but Gh` convinced me in actually posting it. Away we go, Chefs! 1/2 lb of minced meat (hamburger meat, for you Americans) 1/2 lb of giblets, chopped 1 small onion, chopped 3 onion tops, chopped 1 cup of celery 1 small can of mushrooms Salt and pepper 1 cup of raw rice, cooked Combine the minced meat, giblets, onion, onion tops, and celery in sauce pan on medium heat. When meat is brown, turn heat to low, cooking for 1 hour - adding very little water, only as needed. Add mushrooms, cook an additional 10 minutes, season to taste. Mix with rice and serve.

I went to a few parties up north the weekend prior to Halloween, mainly in Boston. Rocked some socks off and partied hard... then came back here. Nothing too horrible happened, nor did I become the "insanely over-intoxicated rampaging David" that some grew to know (lol). Just had fun with friends and kicked back some beers. All was gravy. My grandparents don't like trick-or-treating kids (mainly because they fear that the kids will inevitably attack their house with eggs/toilet paper/gelatin with pig's blood... the last one was one of my old tricks as a kid, don't ask). Either way, we all chilled and I bought them some of those Reese's Peanut Butter pumpkin-shaped treats for them. Other than that, calm on the night of Halloween at least.

This works with any poultry and turns out pretty good. I nearly forgot about this one, even though I just used it last Thanksgiving (which caused me to go even more insane than I used to be...). 1 loaf (large) of stale bread Giblets 2 medium onions, chopped 2 cups of celery, chopped Butter 1/2 lb. Mild Sausage (or hotter, if you're into that) 1 cup of fresh parsley, chopped 1 1/2 to 3 teaspoons of salt (to taste, preferably) 1/2 teaspoon of pepper Accent (if you can find it, All-Spice is a so-so substitute) 1 tablespoon of poultry seasoning Pick apart the bread (crust included, of course), to the size of small corn flakes (or cubes). Put giblets to stew in water, cover and simmer for two hours. Add liver in the last half hour of cooking the giblets. Cook onion and celery in butter until limp, but not brown. Add to bread. Cook sausage until separated. Drain off fat and add to bread. Add remaining ingredients. Mix well. Moisten with broth from giblets, add chopped giblets if you want. NOTE: To vary, substitute 2 slightly beaten eggs, 1/2 cup milk, and 1/2 cup of butter to replace the giblets and their liquid. Add 4 crumbled saltine crackers.

This recipe is primarily for turkey, which is why I'm posting it (gobble, gobble time, yeah?). 4 slices of bacon, chopped 1 cup of celery, chopped 3/4 cup of onion, chopped 1 can of oysters, drained and sliced 1 can of mushrooms, drained Mushroom Juice 2 tablespoons of poultry seasoning 1 teaspoon of salt 10-12 cups of stale bread cubes (or pre-made bread cubes) Evaporated Milk Brown the bacon, then drain and crumble it. Heat celery and onion in the bacon fat until wilted. Drain off the fat and discard. In a large bowl, combine all the ingredients except the mushroom juice and milk. Add only enough juice and milk to moisten, dressing well, 1-2 cups. Stuff the turkey and bake as usual. ------------------------------------ It's also a rather "unique" recipe and I have had it when my grandmother used to cook. Pretty good for you oyster lovers out there.

Dare I be so bold to ask what you all did for Halloween? Baked some pies? Greeted trick-or-treaters? Went trick-or-treating with a family member?

If I were around more often, I would definitely contribute to the idea of a "Poetry Corner" (ala "Readers Corner" motif). Both novellas and poetry can have hours of discussion based on the complexities of simple concepts - ergo, the beauty of poetry. Good luck, (: