Sweet Potato Pancakes

A lot of my friends have asked me for this recipe and I made these this morning so I figured this would be a good first recipe entry.

Breakfast is one of my favorite meals to cook for Wes and has quickly become a favorite to cook for Airlie. When Airlie was little and I made all her baby food I went a little overboard and cooked and pureed way too many sweet potatoes. We didn't get through them and she wanted to eat table food. She really liked pancakes and I was looking for ways to make them healthier for her so I decided to try some sweet potato pancakes. I had them once at a restaurant here in Wilmington and they were delicious. So anyway like I said before sometimes I take shortcuts. So this recipe starts out with Bisquick. I buy Bisquick Heartsmart, but I'm sure regular Bisquick would work fine also. Time is of the essence with a one year old running around and Bisquick removes the unnecessary step of mixing and measuring flour, baking soda, and baking powder. So I modified the pancake recipe on the box to fit my sweet potato need. So you will need:

1 cup Bisquick mix or 1 cup flour, 1 tsp baking powder, 1/2 teaspoon baking soda and pinch of salt

2/3 cup to 1 cup skim milk

2 Tbsp egg product or 2 egg whites

3/4 cup sweet potato puree (about one baked sweet potato; I usually just make an extra one at dinner the night before)

1 tsp pure vanilla extract (buy the good stuff, it does make a difference)

1 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp fresh ground nutmeg (if you have it in the house, which we always do because my husband is a spice addict; notice the nice labeled bottle in the pic) or ground nutmeg

In a bowl whisk together the wet ingredients and then add in the Bisquick or flour mixture. You should have a fairly smooth and almost runny batter, if you don't add more milk, up to a cup until you do.

Spoon mixture onto a hot griddle or frying pan; when they start to get the little bubbles in them they are ready to flip (I prefer a griddle, you can make more at a time and it cooks much more evenly)

If you want to fatten up this recipe you could use one egg instead of the two egg whites and whole milk instead of skim. The pancakes will be more dense and I prefer to have light and fluffy pancakes, hence the reason I use egg whites.

Ok now if it's a Sunday, you have company, or you just want to impress your significant other you could also put some fresh cinnamon whipped cream on top. I'm not sure why most people don't make homemade whipped cream, it is so simple if you have a Kitchen Aid Mixer or a mixer with a whisk attachment. Otherwise you may break a sweat trying to get your cream to whip.

Fresh whipped cream:

1 cup heavy whipping cream

1/4 cup sugar

1 tsp vanilla extract (optional)

1 tsp cinnamon (optional)

Put cream and vanilla in the bowl, turn mixer to medium speed, increase speed while adding sugar and cinnamon, the cream will start to whip up and get the consistency of whipped cream in a couple of minutes. I usually turn mine all the way up to speed 10.

Enjoy these cakes with pure maple syrup. I will say I try to shop smart and I don't splurge on all my ingredients, but two things I will always splurge on are pure maple syrup and pure vanilla extract. Believe me you will notice the difference.

Tomorrow is Sunday so you better be whipping up some of these pancakes! Mine don't have whipped cream because I was trying to be a little good today!

P.S. If you are in the Chicago area some of the best pancakes I ever had were at The Bongo Room in the Wicker Park area in Chicago. www.thebongoroom.com. Check it out!