Hot Cakes
3/4 cup fine zwieback crumbs, or thoroughly dried bread crumbs 3 tablespoons flour, or 1/3 cup buckwheat flour 1/4 teaspoon salt 1 1/2 cups milk 1 egg Mix the crumbs, flour, and salt. Heat the milk, not to boiling, but somewhat hotter than the hand can bear--about 145 degree F. Pour enough of the hot milk over the crumbs to make a rather stiff pour batter. Separate the white from the yolk of the egg. Stir the yolk into the crumb mixture. Beat the white stiff, and fold it into the mixture last. Cook on a hot, slightly oiled griddle till browned on one side, then turn and brown the other side.
A crumb pancake rather than a flour one, leavened only by a beaten egg white. The hinge is the hot milk: it must be hot enough to swell and soften the crumbs, or the cakes stay gritty.
- ZwiebackA twice-baked sweetened rusk, still sold as a boxed teething biscuit and in European groceries as Zwieback. Melba toast or any thoroughly dried plain bread ground to fine crumbs in a food processor does the same job; expect the batter to be slightly less sweet with plain bread.
- The milk temperatureThe recipe fixes 145F and describes it as "somewhat hotter than the hand can bear." Presumably it is warm enough to soften dried crumbs without bringing the milk near a boil. An instant-read thermometer settles it; the milk will steam faintly and show no bubbles.
- Hold back some milkThe instruction is to pour in only enough to make a rather stiff pour batter, not necessarily all 1 1/2 cups. Crumbs vary in how much they absorb, so add the milk gradually and stop at a stiff but pourable batter.
- No chemical leaveningThere is no baking powder or soda here, so all the lift comes from the folded egg white. Beat it to soft-to-firm peaks, fold with a light hand, and cook the batter at once rather than letting it stand.
- Buckwheat optionThe 1/3 cup buckwheat flour is not a like-for-like swap for the 3 tablespoons of white flour; it makes a heavier, darker, distinctly earthy cake and will need a little more milk.
- Griddle heatThe recipe says only "a hot, slightly oiled griddle"; medium, around 350-375F on an electric griddle, suits it. If you use sweetened zwieback the cakes will colour faster, so watch that the outside does not darken before the centre sets.
- YieldPerhaps eight to twelve small cakes, enough for two. Cook them small: this batter is soft and hard to turn in large rounds.