Adventures in Cooking :: Pancakes & Cupcakes (with recipes!)

So, I didn't sleep well Saturday night/Sunday morning and by 6am, I was tired of tossing and turning, so I got up and decided to do some baking.

My sis-in-law Amy's birthday was Sunday, so I started by baking her some strawberry cupcakes with Cream Cheese Buttercream frosting.  I had actually made her a cake the night before, but it was a complete and total failure!  So... I resorted to cupcakes!

The cupcakes were straight from a mix, but I tried a new Cream Cheese frosting recipe and it was really great!  I decided to some with pink sparkles and some with red sugar.  They turned out soooo pretty!  Here's the recipe for the icing:

 Cream Cheese Buttercream

1 cup butter (at room temp)
1/2 cup Crisco
8 oz. cream cheese (at room temp)
1 Tbsp. vanilla
3 lbs powdered sugar
2-3 Tbsp. milk (add to get consistency to pipe or spread)

Mix butter, Crisco, and cream cheese on low speed for a couple of minutes until well combined.  Add in vanilla. Next add powdered sugar a little at a time, until it's all incorporated.  This icing will be very stiff!  Add milk as needed until desired consistency is reached for spreading and/or piping.  This recipe is great for decorating.  It will form a nice crust and it holds up well!

After I got done with the cupcakes, I decided to make pancakes.  My kids had been begging for pancakes all week and I hadn't felt like making them, so I figured since I still had a couple of hours before church, I'd whip up a batch of pancakes.  This particular recipe makes a huge stack of pancakes, but I managed to mess it up and ended up having to double it.

You see, the measurements for baking soda and baking powder are next to each other and I mixed them up...putting way too much of one and not enough of the other.   The only way I knew to make sure they didn't flop and I didn't waste all of the ingredients was to double everything.   Needless to say, we'll have pancakes in the freezer for the next few weeks!

Just to mix things up, and because I had them on hand, I added fresh blueberries to half of the batter, so we have some plain pancakes, some blueberry!  By the time I was done, we had pancakes for Sunday morning breakfast, Sunday night supper, Monday morning breakfast, and bowls and bowls in the frig and freezer.  I guess my kids won't be needing me to make pancakes anytime soon!

If you can believe it, these pics do not represent ALL of the pancakes.  These were taken after all 7 of us had eaten breakfast and supper last night...anywho....here's my most favorite recipe for pancakes:

Super Fluffy Buttermilk Pancakes

3 cups buttermilk*
4 eggs
1/2 cup butter, melted
1/2 cupsugar
4 teaspoons baking powder
2 teaspoons baking soda
2 teaspoons salt
4 cups all purpose flour (you can use white or wheat or a combination of the two)

First, mix all the liquid ingredients together until well combined (about one minute on high).  Sift together the dry ingredients and slowly mix them into the liquid ingredients until the batter is smooth.  It will be thick, but that's okay! 

Cook on a hot griddle (I set mine to 350°).  This recipe makes enough pancakes for our family of 7 and we always have leftovers!   The keep great in the frig for a day or two or can be frozen to use later (which is obviously what we'll be doing this week).

*If I don't have buttermilk on hand, I use soured milk OR I take 3 cups of regular milk, take out 3 tablespoons and add in 3 tablespoons of white vinegar.  If you let it sit for just a couple of minutes, it will curdle and work just like buttermilk in the recipe.  I also use this for any recipe that calls for buttermilk when I don't have it on hand.  Just take out one tablespoon of milk for each cup needed and add in one tablespoon of vinegar.

So, did you have any baking/cooking adventures this weekend?

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