Weird Recipe Wednesday: Apple Ring Pancakes

Weird Recipe Wednesday: Because some recipes are so weird I just HAVE to try them.  My curiosity always gets the better of me.

I've been chowing down an insane amount of apples this fall.  We've made 3 trips to the orchard and each time we come home with a 1/2 bushel of seconds plus a smaller bag of another variety. A bushel of apples weighs between 42 and 48 pounds so I'm guessing we've hit the 70-80 lb range in total.  Yikes, that looks like so much more when you add it all up.  Crisp and tart are my favorite, but my last trip to the orchard left me with a bag of soft and mildly sweet apples.  They're great for sauce or apple butter, but they're not my favorite for munching.  Since this is the 3rd 1/2 bushel bag of the season, I've had more than my fair share of pie and apple crisp.  I was up for a change of pace and thought I'd give these pancakes a whirl.

I'm not a big breakfast eater.  A bowl of cereal, an apple, just give me something that requires zero thought.  Every once in a while I'll put a little more effort into breakfast and make something like muffins or pancakes.  Don't get me wrong, I like breakfast food, I just don't eat it at breakfast time.  More often than not I'll eat the muffins as a snack or make pancakes, waffles or French toast for Sunday lunch.  So yeah, these pancakes hit the griddle around 3 in the afternoon but we can pretend I made them for breakfast.

I saw this idea last fall and am just now getting around to it.  Amazing what a dreary day and an excess of apples will motivate you to try.  Apples are cored, then thinly sliced crosswise to form rings (think doughnut shape).  After a quick dip in pancake batter the slices find their way to a hot griddle before parking themselves on your plate.

I tried a new pancake batter recipe, but it wasn't one I'd use again.  I had a little trouble with the batter sliding off the apples, but nothing too serious. Go for a thicker batter and be sure to slice your apples less than 1/4-inch thick. These seemed a little soggy to me, especially in the center, but that could be the batter recipe I used or the fact that the apples were pretty soft.   A firmer apple variety would hold more moisture instead of releasing it into the pancake.  I sprinkled the tops of the uncooked pancakes with cinnamon sugar before flipping them, that part was definitely repeatable.  If I had had any caramel on hand I would've been tempted to use that instead of syrup. Good thing that was an afterthought.  I now have 4 fewer apples, which still leaves me with well over 50.  Hmmmm.....so many things to try and so little time.

Food for Thought: "The only limit to our realization of tomorrow will be our doubts of today. Let us move forward with strong and active faith." -Franklin D. Roosevelt