A Rainy Sunday's Peach Buttermilk Pancakes:

My fiance has this habit of eating everything within eyesight, arms-reach, or our apartment. It's a habit of his that I've learned to deal with and for the most part, I find it quite useful, especially when the week-old leftovers suddenly go missing and I can rest assured that they didn't go to waste! On this dreary Sunday morning, however, his little habit got the best of me. I'm home alone, the rain is falling, and all I want to do is start my day with a hot cup of coffee and a tall stack of blueberry pancakes. But alas, my (apparently not-so-secret) stash of frozen, wild Maine blueberries turned up missing! Well, being the creature of substitution that I am, I scoured the kitchen until I stumbled upon a mostly full jar of peach preserves from Italy, which I used a few weeks back in my Pi Day Peach and Yogurt Museli Pie and I have to admit, I think I created the best pancake recipe, yet! Crispy on the edges, light and fluffy in the middle and just a hint of sweetness, ah perfection.

Peach Buttermilk Pancakes
1 cup unbleached all-purpose flour
1 tbsp granulated sugar
1/4 tsp table salt
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp baking soda
1 cup buttermilk
2 tbsp plain Greek yogurt
1 tbsp peach preserves
1 large egg
2 tbsp salted butter, melted, slightly cooled
extra butter & vegetable oil as needed during cooking
1. Melt butter so that it has time to cool. I usually heat the pan I am going to cook in, melt the butter half-way and move it into a dish to cool. The melted butter will continue to melt the unmelted butter and once it has all melted, it wont be nearly as hot as it would be if you left it over a flame until it was all melted. Plus, you wont accidently forget about the melting butter and end up with brown butter, as is per usual when I'm cooking.
(Once the melted butter has been removed from the pan, wipe the pan down with a dry cloth and leave it on a low flame so that it slowly comes up to temperature and is hot and ready to use when the batter is ready.)
2. In an electric mixer, combine all dry ingredients, mix quickly to combine.
3. In a separate bowl, whisk the egg, add the yogurt, peach preserves and buttermilk, whisk until mostly combined (it's a little difficult to get the yogurt and peach preserves to mix well, but thats okay).
4. Add the melted butter to wet mixture last, that way the butter has had enough time to cool and you will lower the amount of butter that clumps back up when it's thrown into a cool liquid. Also, adding the butter last ensures that you will not be pouring hot butter on raw egg, which as I'm sure we've all learned, leads to partially cooked scrambled eggs.
5. Turn the electric mixer on medium, slowly pour in the wet ingredients. Once all wet ingredients have been added, bump the mixer speed up to high for a few seconds and then turn off the mixer. The batter should be lumpy.
6. In your now perfectly heated pan, add a tsp of butter and a tsp of oil, allow the butter to melt and bubble, wait for the bubbles to subside and then pour some batter to your preference. I used a 6 in pan so I just poured in enough batter to cover the bottom. Allow the pancake to cook on the first side until small bubbles begin to pop up sporadically throughout the cake (about 3 minutes). Use a spatula to flip and cook the other side for another minute or two, use your judgement.
7. If you're making a large batch of pancakes, heat your oven to 200 degrees and place cooked pancakes on a sheet pan until ready to serve.
8. I recommend serving whatever remaining peach preserves you have to melt on top of the warm pancakes, or the usual butter and pure Maple syrup will be equally delicious.

Enjoy.

(Note: This recipe makes approximately 3-6 inch wide, 1/2 inch deep pancakes, perfect for one person. If you're making breakfast for a group, be sure to double, triple or quadruple this recipe as need be. Also, I adapted this recipe from Cook's Illustrated Best Buttermilk Pancakes Recipe. If you are not a member of Cook's Illustrated, might I suggest you head on over and set up an account? Their website and monthly magazines are packed full of tried and true recipes, from savory to sweet, you wont be disappointed!)

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