Dutch Baby

If you aren’t familiar with Dutch Babies, they are:

A Dutch baby pancake, sometimes called a German pancake, is a sweet breakfast dish similar to Yorkshire pudding and derived from the German Apfelpfannkuchen. It is made with eggs, flour and milk, and usually seasoned with vanilla and cinnamon, although occasionally sugar is also added. It is baked in a metal pan and falls soon after being removed from the oven. It is generally served with fresh squeezed lemon, butter, and powdered sugar or fruit toppings or syrup.

They have popped back into the meal rotation around here on Farmer’s Market days. Eight farm fresh eggs, some flour and sugar and vanilla and milk and lots of butter later, we welcome this baby to the table. The kids like it with syrup, and hubby and I like it with cherry clove preserves from the market. Tonight it was accompanied by sausage and watermelon from Misty Meadows Farm, cantelope from Sunshine Farms, a bowl of lots of different kinds of cherry tomatoes from Finger Pickin’ Farms, and fried potatoes from our community garden.

Here’s the recipe I use, but there are lots floating around. I can’t imagine making it in anything besides a big cast iron skillet.

Ingredients

• 1 3/4 stick butter
• 2 C all purpose flour
• 6 T sugar
• 1 t vanilla
• 8 whole large eggs
• 1/2 t kosher salt
• 2 cups half and half (milk was all we had tonight)
• 3/4 C powdered sugar
• Your choice of toppings

Preheat oven to 375.

Place 3/4 stick of butter into a 10 inch cast iron skillet and place in the oven for butter to melt.

Melt the remaining butter and set aside to cool slightly.

Place the flour, vanilla, sugar, salt, milk, eggs and remaining butter into the bowl and mix with hand mixer or in a food processor until mixed well and frothy. Carefully pour the batter into the preheated skillet.

Bake on the middle rack of the oven for 30 to 35 minutes or until the edges are puffed and brown. (I generally have to bump this to 40 minutes or so until the center has set.)

Sprinkle with powdered sugar. Top with syrup, lemon juice, marinated berries, jams, or just about anything else that strikes your fancy.

This particular recipe comes from The Pioneer Woman, but recipes abound online, many of them tailored incrementally for larger or smaller babies.