Dutch Babies, again

A Dutch Baby is a baked, eggy pancake.  I've also seen them called German Pancakes and at Walker Brothers, where I first ate one, the German Pancake is just a large version of the Dutch Baby.  It's similar to a popover and is served with powdered sugar and lemon.  Delicious.  I wrote about Dutch Babies on my old blog after I found a recipe in A Homemade Life.  Since then I've been refining them and simplifying the process.  It really is easy to do.  Much easier, I think, than regular pancakes.  When Matthias and I were having dinner last Sunday at Ev and Ron's house, Ron mentioned that the German Pancake from Walker Brothers is his very favorite.  I forgot to mail them a copy of the recipe and then I figured I could document the recipe here and share it with everybody at once.

One of the things that makes the recipe so simple is that it only calls for a few ingredients: butter, eggs, milk, flour and salt.  You also need some powdered sugar and lemon to be added at the table.  The other thing that makes it easy is that you bake the pancake.  Mix it, throw it in the oven and your work is done.

First, preheat the oven to 425.  Add butter to your pan or pans.  My recipe serves two (doubling the recipe or making enough for 3 is very easy and works well) and you can either make one thick pancake or two thinner ones.  It's up to you and I've tried a variety of sizes of pans and I've made it as one and I've made it as two in a variety of sizes.  They all turn out well.  Today I used two 9 inch metal pie pans.  Use whatever you have on hand.  When using two pans I put 1 tablespoon of butter into each pan (or 2 tablespoons in one pan) and place the pans in the preheating oven so the butter will melt.  While mixing up the pancake, don't forget the butter.  You want it to totally melt, but you don't want it to burn.

For the pancakes (to serve 2) you need:
4 eggs
1/2 cup milk
1/2 cup flour
1/4 tsp. salt

Into a small bowl crack the eggs and whisk until foamy.  Add the milk and continue whisking.  Add flour and salt and whisk until flour is fully dissolved.

Turn pan(s), evenly distributing butter on all surfaces.  Pour batter into pans. 

Bake for 18 minutes or so.  While baking, prepare the lemon, cutting into wedges and get out the powdered sugar.

 

I usually just put the container of powdered sugar on the table when it's family, but for guests you can get fancy, serving it in whatever bowls or cups you'd like.

The pancakes will puff up in the oven, ideally forming a bowl-like shape (although sometimes they will expand with all sorts of bumps and lumps).

Once removed from the oven they will deflate a bit.

And on plates they'll probably be somewhat flat.

Before eating sprinkle with powdered sugar and generously squeeze lemons over the entire pancake.  I prefer mine with LOTS of both.

The lemon juice will melt into the powdered sugar and the results are delicious.

I hope you'll try it and tell me what you think!