Strawberry Puree Pancakes

Three years ago, I went on the hunt for a strawberry pancake recipe. I found one, and made it. And sure, it was good--but it wasn't exactly what I had been looking for. We found that adding strawberry chunks to the batter resulted in extra moisture, which made for a somewhat soggy pancake in the areas in which the strawberries were cooked inside. "Soggy" has a horrible connotation, but it's just for a lack of a better way to describe it. I promise, they weren't THAT bad. At any rate, we never loved them enough to think about making them again.

As Michael and I talked about plans for Mother's Day, I mentioned that I'd like to get up on Sunday and make some pancakes. I hadn't made any since prior to starting our kitchen renovation, so cooking a wonderful homemade breakfast seemed long overdue.

Then, while grocery shopping on Saturday morning, I noticed that the price of strawberries had come down quite a bit, and the 2 lb. containers were full of bright red, delicious-looking strawberries. On a whim, we snagged a container, and later, it came to me: strawberry pancakes. I needed to make strawberry pancakes.

But I also needed to find a new recipe. I knew right away that I wanted to find something that incorporated strawberry puree instead of strawberry pieces, so I googled accordingly.

And just as I had imagined three years ago, the strawberry puree was the answer. It's difficult to tell once the pancakes are cooked to be golden brown, but the inside of the pancakes are a pretty shade of light pink. The strawberry flavor is uniformly distributed throughout each pancake to give it subtle fruity undertones. I lightly sprinkled them with powdered sugar and a slight drizzle of maple syrup and... yum.

Nora ate THREE pancakes + a boatload of fresh strawberries on the side, so needless to say, she was a huge fan, too. And she ate them completely plain, so that's a testament in and of itself. After she had polished off two, I asked her, "Are you all done?" and she vehemently shook her head. I then asked, "Do you want more?" and a huge smile spread across her face and she waved her arms and kicked her legs excitedly. When I brought her third one over to her, she literally raised her arms and made a "cheering" motion. I kid you not. With success like that, we had no choice but to declare these the pancake of choice for summer weekends.

So open those windows for some fresh air, enjoy the cool, crisp mornings, and pick yourself up some strawberries. Warm up a skillet or griddle and start the day off right. You'll thank me later.

As I often do, I doubled the original recipe to accommodate my pancake-loving girl. She loves leftover pancakes reheated in the toaster! This makes about 16 average-sized pancakes; I use approximately 1/4 cup batter for each pancake.

Strawberry Puree Pancakes
(Source: Adapted from Cin Cin, Let's Eat!)

Ingredients: 
- 2 cups flour
- 4 tbsp of granulated sugar
- 2 tsp baking powder
- 1/8 tsp salt
- 1 cup strawberry puree (made from approximately 2 cups of fresh strawberries)
- 2 eggs
- 1 to 1 & 1/2 cups milk
- 2 tbsp melted butter, more for cooking

Directions: 
1. Mix dry ingredients together in a bowl: flour, baking powder, sugar, and salt.

2. Lightly beat the egg in a separate bowl. Add in 1/2 cup of milk, strawberry puree, then melted butter. Mix well.

3. Add the wet ingredients to the dry, whisk to get all the lumps out. Add more milk if the batter is too dry and lumpy. (Note: I only needed the 1 cup of milk. Add more only if you need to thin out your batter.)

4. Heat the griddle or skillet over medium heat, grease with a dab of butter or cooking spray, then cook away. Scoop 1/4 cup of batter for each pancake.

5. Serve with powdered sugar, honey, or a little syrup.