A pancake, or a Polish naleśnik?

I’ll be straight with you: I don’t know myself whether this is a naleśnik, the thin Polish kind, or a pancake. Probably more of a pancake, but my little girl wouldn’t eat a “cake from a pan”. She’d eat a naleśnik, though. So for her it’s always a naleśnik. Mind you, when they serve them at school, she gets a dose of cognitive dissonance: “Daddy’s naleśniki are different, so I’m not eating whatever it is they call naleśniki here.” (I don’t know if that’s a good example of cognitive dissonance, but never mind.)

Anyway, these aren’t the thin pancakes your granny used to make you. These are real chubby ones. I used to make little ones, classic American-style, but lately I’ve been making them the full width of my 32 cm frying pan. So they’re big and thick.

Ninka likes them best with… go on, have a guess. Nutella. Our Sunday morning breakfast conversation usually goes like this:

“Ninka, sweetie, what would you like for breakfast?”

“Uhh, ummm, I don’t know if you’ll say yes.”

“Why wouldn’t I say yes?”

“Uhhh, ummm, well, ’cause we already had it for breakfast yesterday… Pancakes with Nyutella!”

“Ah. All right, then…”

When strawberries and raspberries were in season, at least there was something healthy to go with the Nutella. Blueberries are a good option now, too.

I don’t like mine with Nutella. I prefer forest fruit jam and Almette yoghurt cream cheese. That’s the version in the photo.

At a glance:

Prep time: 15 minutes

Serves: 2

How many calories:  this many calories (click at your own risk)

Ingredients for fluffy pancakes:

• 200 grams of wheat flour
• half a litre of buttermilk
• 50 grams of butter
• half a teaspoon of baking soda
• a pinch of salt
• a teaspoon of sugar

Toppings:

• Nutella
• Forest fruit jam
• Almette yoghurt cream cheese
• Honey
• Cinnamon

Method (let’s do it):

That was a long intro, so I’ll keep the recipe short. Into a tall bowl go the so-called dry ingredients (apparently that’s the technical term in recipes). That’s the flour, salt (a pinch), sugar (I use a teaspoon) and baking soda (that’s what makes our pancake-naleśniki nice and fluffy). I give it all a stir. Meanwhile, I melt the butter in a small frying pan. I add an egg to my dry ingredients, give them a quick stir and pour in the buttermilk (in truth, I pour in whatever I’ve got in the fridge. Sometimes it’s even milk, sometimes kefir, and sometimes I add a splash of full-fat fresh cream. Of course it changes the flavour, but they’re all pretty good).

I mix everything with a spoon (no mixers or blenders, just a plain old spoon). The batter shouldn’t be too runny (remember, the melted butter is still to come). Lumps are fine, though. Don’t worry about them. Finally I add the butter and give everything another good stir. That’s the batter ready.

Now I take a frying pan, heat it over medium “heat” (on my hob, on a scale of 1 to 10, that’s 6) and pour the batter into the pan. Keep an eye on the pancake so it doesn’t burn, and flip it after about 90 to 180 seconds. The finished pancakes should be nicely browned.

When a pancake’s ready, I serve it spread with whatever the person eating it fancies. Quick and easy. Enjoy!