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Peach and Sour Cream Pancakes

Source of Recipe

From "The Smitten Kitchen Cookbook" by Deb Perelman


Recipe Introduction

"Now, I cringe remembering this story, but, seeing that I suspect it was my mother's proudest moment to date in my culinary development and that it related to pancakes, it seems only fitting that I tell you here about the day in my freshman year of college when my friends and I talked another friend, one with a car, into taking us out to the IHOP in Arlington, Virginia, for a very exciting meal of Something, Anything That Wasn't on our Meal Plan. Everything was going great until I realized—insert your best joke about dashed hopes that higher education might teach your narrator common sense—that the menu was mostly pancakes. And I didn't think their pancakes tasted very good. In fact, I always thought they tasted like the three very most scathing words in my mother's food vocabulary, and I said them there at the table that night: 'from a mix.' My friends rightfully called me out. 'You're such a pancake snob!' they said. The next day, I relayed that story to my mother, and I could sense her beaming from hundreds of miles away. She still loves that story. In fact, if you ask her whether she ever knew that one day I was going to be someone who did a lot of cooking, she'll repeat the Pancake Story—right after she tells you about the time that I made brownies and forgot the flour—and say, 'Maybe.' So, obviously, we must begin with pancakes. That are not from a mix. But not just any pancakes, upside-down cakes parading as pancakes. I made them on a whim one summer, and though I hadn't expected them to be terrible or anything, I hadn't anticipated the marriage of peaches and sour cream to be so weepingly delicious. The sugar in the peaches, it *caramelizes* in the butter and then melts into the pancake, and it left us with no other options but to spend all of the months of winter and spring lamenting how long it would be before I could make them again."

List of Ingredients

â—¦ 1 large egg
â—¦ 1 cup (8 ounces) sour cream
â—¦ ¼ teaspoon vanilla extract
â—¦ 2 tablespoons sugar
â—¦ ¼ teaspoon table salt
â—¦ ¼ teaspoon ground cinnamon
â—¦ Pinch of ground nutmeg
â—¦ ¾ cup all-purpose flour
â—¦ 1 teaspoon baking powder
â—¦ ½ teaspoon baking soda
â—¦ Butter, for pan
â—¦ 1 peach, halved, pitted, and very thinly sliced (about â…›-inch slices)


Recipe

Preheat your oven to 250 degrees. Whisk the egg, sour cream, vanilla, and sugar together in the bottom of a large bowl. In a separate bowl, whisk together the salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, flour, baking powder, and baking soda. Fold dry ingredients into wet, mixing until just combined and still a little lumpy.

Heat your skillet or sauté pan to medium-low. A cast-iron skillet is my favorite to use for pancakes but if you don't have one, just use your heaviest skillet for best browning. Melt a pat of butter in the bottom of the pan, and ladle in ¼ cup batter at a time, leaving at least 2 inches between pancakes. Arrange two peach slices over the batter. Don't worry if they are bigger than the batter puddle, because the pancake will spread as it cooks. When the pancakes are dry around the edges and you can see bubbles forming on the top, after about 3 to 4 minutes, get your spatula all the way underneath the pancake-and-peach puddle, and flip it in one quick movement. If any peaches try to slide out from underneath, nudge them back where they belong.

Cook for another 5 minutes, until the pancakes are golden brown on the underside and the peach slices are nicely caramelized. If they're browning too quickly, lower your heat. Transfer the pancakes to a tray in your warm oven as they cook, which will ensure they fully set and keep them warm until you're ready to serve them.

Makes eight 4-inch pancakes