Dad’s Buttermilk Pancake Recipe

My husband and I are creatures of habit when it comes to breakfast. I usually have Carnation Instant Breakfast and a Diet Coke; he eats hot cereal—oatmeal or Malt-o-Meal or something similar. When I’m in a hurry, I’ll eat granola bars, and sometimes he will have Shredded Wheat or another cold cereal.

But occasionally on a Sunday morning, my husband makes pancakes and bacon. I try not to mix up my instant breakfast until I see if we are having a pancake Sunday, because I wouldn’t want to miss out on my share. He uses a pancake mix—one of a variety that we have been given as gifts or that he has purchased to try out. His favorite is a mix from College of the Ozarks (buy it here), which is fine if you like a whole wheat flour that isn’t too heavy.

My favorite pancakes are not from a mix at all, but are my father’s buttermilk pancakes. On weekend mornings when I was a child, I’d stay in bed until I smelled the bacon cooking. No microwaved bacon then—my father fried it on the stove. One morning when I was about seven or eight, I leaned over the pan, and the grease popped and burned my forehead. I had a small round scar there for years.

After he fried the bacon, he mixed up the pancake batter. There was a variation of the batter for waffles, but I preferred pancakes, so that’s what I hoped for. These pancakes were light enough I could eat eight to ten. They were sweet, but with a little tang of buttermilk. Topped with maple syrup or sometimes raspberry jam. Mmm.

The taste still says childhood and weekend and comfort to me.

When I married and my mother typed up a box of recipes for me to have, the pancake recipe was one I made sure she included. Unfortunately, my husband prefers a heartier pancake to these light as a feather buttermilk ones, so we rarely make them.

And my father made them less often once the children were gone, preferring instead to make omelets to accompany the bacon. But he still fried his bacon on the stove, even after microwaves were available. I know, because when I visited, I had to clean the stove afterward. He never did like to clean.

Here’s the Buttermilk Pancake recipe:

pancake recipe 20150625_185334

It doubles well, if you have lots of people around. Sometimes my father had to make second batches, even after doubling it.

What foods say childhood and comfort to you?

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