Improving my basic pancakes

After years of intensive Saturday morning research, I think I figured out the solution to my longestr running pancake problem. Namely, the problem where your first pancake is way uglier than your second pancake. I think I've got a trick to fix that. But I also think that I've improved my batter a bit. This is just for basic pancakes, nothing fancy. I start with a tablespoon or so of butter in a Pyrex, which I can throw in the microwave to melt. Try not to get it super hot to the point where it would prematurely cook the egg. Just to be safe, I put my tablespoon of sugar in the hot butter first to cool it down a bit. We're adding a lot of room temperature mass in there relative to the butter. Now is when I crack in my egg, and when I'm feeling super fancy, I whip the white for extra fluffiness, but not today. Mix that nice and smooth, which is easier to do when the mixture is still really thick before we thin it out with milk. I used to add just enough milk to get a cup of total liquid. I've since concluded that's too much egg protein relative to the total water in the recipe. The pancakes come out tough. I go up to like a cup and a half now. Metric measurements are in the description as always. More milk means more water, more steam during cooking and a looser protein structure that just cooks up softer. Now for the small ingredients. A big splash of vanilla to make these taste like they're from an overpriced brunch restaurant or you know a linta. Half a teaspoon of my normal kosher salt. Just a teaspoon of baking powder. I used to use more for more lift, but I was using so much that it was affecting the flavor because baking powder has a salty bitter taste. That's the leavenning. For browning enhancement, I've taken to adding a/4 teaspoon of baking soda. Not for leavenning, but just to raise the pH a bit. If you have it, a tablespoon of some kind of pure starch is nice. It will make the all-purpose flour behave a bit more like cake flour, which is lower protein. and it bakes up softer. It'll end up being almost a cup and a half of allpurpose flour, but I do a little at a time until I like the thickness. This is way too thin. You know, when I first did this on the internet many years ago, a reply guy said that it was unprofessional and juvenile of me to use a fork instead of a whisk, despite, you know, forks sharing many key properties with whisks. Dude, if you're still out there, you continue to live rentree in my mind because I'm just so curious about your life. Like, how do you function? Anyway, this is still a little bit thinner than I like. Thicker batter means thicker pancakes, but it will thicken up more as it sits and rests, which I've also found to be really beneficial. I'm always sure now to rest the batter for at least 15 minutes before cooking. That's about the time that you need for autolyis, where water interacts with the starches and the proteins to essentially make them stickier. This helps the pancakes stretch and retain more steam bubbles when they cook. Good pancakes are easy, but they're not super quick. Nor are they particularly healthy for me. When I want something quick and good for me, I turn to Hungry Routt, sponsor of this video. Hungry Root is a way to get your groceries online without having to make all of the decisions yourself if you don't want to. You just tell them what your dietary goals are, how many meals you want to cook from scratch versus how many like semi-prepared meals versus fully prepared meals and snacks. Hungry Root has it all. Whether you want to keep it vegan or gluten-free, whatever common restriction you have. Here's my recipe card for the fresh meals that I asked for. Ooh, lamb. And then we've got the prepackaged sweets and snacks they sent. Our favorite are these seed and nut flour crackers. And you know about Lauren and her granola. I'm always looking for healthier prepared foods for when I'm in a rush. So, I just dropped these Brussels in a pan, mixed in the rice and lentil pouch, and boom, a super high-fiber, vitamin rich meal. Here's an exclusive offer. For a limited time, get 40% off your first box, plus a free item in every box for life. Hit my link below or go to hungryroot.com and use code raggusia. That's 40% off your first box and a free item of your choice for life at hungryroot.com with code ragusia. Thank you, hungry. Anyway, I'm using my old non-stick griddle. I find that I get more even cooking if I let it heat up longer and slower, slower heat for a longer time. And I I still use butter as my thermometer. When it browns, but not instantly, that's perfect. And on goes some batter. Now, here's the thing. This pancake is going to taste fine. It's going to taste great. Wait to see the bubbles forming. Wait for the bottom to be solid. And it's time to flip. The thing is, the color on top is going to be super uneven. This is probably due to the butter being concentrated in little droplets on the pan. The surface tension of the butter is simply stronger than the chemical forces that would cause it to stick to the pan, which on Teflon are virtually nil. Notice the bottom side of the pancake is uniformly amber. That's because the first side either absorbed or flattened out those droplets of butter. The first pancake is always ugly. So here, let's do a second one right on the same spot. Don't ask me why, but this is my stupid project in life to get the first pancake looking as nice as the second pancake. Are we sure that the butter is the problem? Well, let's rebutter the surface on this already used pan, change no other variables, and then yeah, the butter seems to cause the uneven color. Let's wash it all off thoroughly, and then try again. You can cook pancakes on just bare teflon, no fat at all. You'll get even color, but they won't taste quite as good. And without the thermal interface of the butter, they cook slower, which makes them a little bit tougher in the end. So, here's what I've done for years. Butter the pan and then wipe it, trying to smash the butter into an even layer that is as thin and minimal as possible. No big droplets. Will this get us nice even surface browning? Not really. I mean, it's better, but it's still super patchy, which doesn't actually matter, except for some reason that I've decided that it does. Nice puffing on that pancake, though. You get that from the extra milk and the extra resting time on the batter. also from being as aggressive as you can with your heat just to make steam. Okay, now here's the trick that really helps with the color. I'm starting with a clean pan. No cheating. I figure what's making that smooth thermal interface for the smooth color is a mixture of fat and the residual cooked starches and the proteins and stuff from the previous pancake. So, I figure let's sacrifice a little drop of batter. Smoosh it around with the butter on the hot pan to create a film of cooked batter and fat, just like the pancake would leave behind. Let that film cook for a second and then wipe it gently until it looks clean, but it isn't really. Now, drop on your first pancake. Wait for the bubbles and the solidifying bottom. Flip. And I told you so. It's not perfectly bronze, but it's really close. That is the best trick I've got for this admittedly silly problem of ugly first pancakes. However, you could instead just serve your ugly first pancake bottoms up because the bottom will always be perfectly amber. Bottom or top, it's a personal choice.