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Bread Griddlecakes
1-11/2 LOAVES DRY I-I MILK BREAD I CUP FLOUR I TEASPOON SALT I TEASPOON SODA I TEASPOON GRATED NUTMEG 2 TABLESPOONS SUGAR 2 EGGS, SEPARATED Soak bread in sufficient milk to make soft. Rub through colander until you have about 4 cups. Sift dry ingredients together, stir with soaked bread, add egg yolks and beat vigorously.
The batter should be a little thicker than for ordinary pancakes. Beat egg whites stiff and fold in just before baking.
A thrift recipe for using up stale bread, and one that behaves differently from a flour pancake batter: the bread does the work of most of the flour, so the mixing is about texture rather than gluten.
- The hinge: judge by the colander, not the clockSoak the bread only until it collapses under a spoon, then push it through a colander or coarse sieve until you have about 4 cups of smooth pulp. Any unsoftened crust left in will not break down on the griddle and shows up as hard flecks.
- How much bread, how much milkThe recipe calls for 1 to 1 1/2 loaves of dry milk bread; what that weighs depends entirely on the loaf. Milk is added by eye until the bread is soft -- probably two or three cups -- and you stop when the pulp mounds rather than pours, working toward the 4 cups the recipe specifies.
- The soda needs an acidThe soda -- A teaspoon of soda with little acid in the batter can taste soapy. If you prefer, soak the bread in buttermilk or in milk soured with a tablespoon of lemon juice or vinegar so the soda has something to work against; the recipe as written says only milk.
- Griddle heatMedium, about 375F on an electric griddle or a skillet where a drop of water skitters rather than vanishes instantly. This batter is heavier than a flour batter and browns before the center sets if the pan is too hot; give the cakes 3 to 4 minutes on the first side.
- Batter consistency"A little thicker than for ordinary pancakes" means it should drop from the ladle in a lump and spread slowly. Thin it with a spoonful of milk at a time if it will not spread at all; thicken with a little more flour if the cakes run flat.
- Fold the whites lastCook within about fifteen minutes of folding in the whites: the soda begins working once it is wet, and beaten whites deflate if the batter stands.
- NutmegA full teaspoon of grated nutmeg is assertive by current taste. Half a teaspoon reads as seasoning rather than spice cake if you would rather serve these with savory accompaniments.
- YieldAbout 18 to 20 cakes of three to four inches, enough for four to six people. They hold well on a plate in a low oven, which suits a camp or outdoor griddle where everything cooks in batches.
Bread griddlecakes belong to a long line of stale-bread cookery that appears in nineteenth- and early twentieth-century American household books alongside bread puddings, brown betties and panadas, where dry bread is commonly soaked back to softness in milk. The colander step suits a kitchen without a blender: forcing softened bread through perforated tin gave a smooth pulp. Its appearance in an outdoor cooking collection makes sense on two counts -- a griddle over a fire or camp stove is easier to manage than an oven, and bread that has gone hard in a pack or chuck box is exactly the raw material the recipe assumes. "A stack of wheats" was diner and short-order shorthand for a plate of pancakes.