Breakfasting

My husband has been in Italy since last Friday.  (Sigh, jealous). He gets home tomorrow so we are all very excited!  I have been alone with the kids for longer than I ever thought my sanity could handle.  Today, to celebrate my ability to keep two little people alive and happy for that long without the help of my spouse, we are having a day of fun in the kitchen!
Vance, like his mommy, loves to cook.  Also, like his mommy, he can eat his weight in pancakes.  It is a special talent reserved for us elite bread lovers.  This morning we started by making these insanely wonderful pancake bites that I found on Pinterest.  One of the easiest and most gratifying breakfasts I have made in a while.  We typically start our day with a big bowl of hearty steel cut oats so this was a treat!  You can use any pancake batter recipe, so Vance and I whipped up a batch of my family's favorite whole wheat blueberry pancakes.
All you have to do is pour the batter into muffin tins instead of onto a griddle, and bake for about 15 minutes at 350 degrees.  Genius. Ours took 17 minutes and they were amazing.  They are perfect for a toddler and a hungry mommy.  We didn't even need to put extra sweetener on them because I added pure maple syrup to the batter.  You wish you were invited for breakfast?  Maybe next time.  I might need to restrain myself from making these everyday of my life.




Blueberry Pancake Bites

1 cup whole wheat pastry flour (or regular whole wheat flour)
2 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1-2 Tbsp pure maple syrup (or your family's preferred sweetener)
1 egg, lightly beaten
1 1/4 cup milk
3 Tbsp butter, melted
Frozen or fresh blueberries (to taste)

Preheat oven to 350. Mix the dry ingredients in a bowl.  Add in the wet ingredients, including the butter.  Mix gently until batter is smooth, making sure all of the flour is absorbed.

Grease a 12 cup muffin tin.  Pour the batter into eat muffin cup.  This batter will not rise as much as a muffin or a cupcake so you can fill them almost to the top.  Sprinkle blueberries or topping if choice into the muffin cups.  We might try bananas and walnuts or strawberries next time!

Bake for anywhere from 12-20 minutes.  The baking will depend on your batter and the toppings inside.  You don't want them to be browned on top, but instead a little brown around the edges.  You can tell they are done when you insert a toothpick and it comes out clean.  Ours took 17 minutes to get to that point...but only about five minutes to disappear.