Swedish Oatmeal Pancakes

Some recipes have a wonderful way of following you around like a tenacious honeybee. This is one I clipped from the San Jose Mercury News during graduate school, thinking it might be a hit with my then boyfriend, now husband, because of its reputed Swedish origin. We even made them for his parents, who doubted the providence but loved the pancakes. Then somehow the clipping went missing. Several years later, when we departed the Bay Area to start our jobs in Oregon, my best friend gave us a book of San Francisco recipes, and flipping through I discovered the recipe again, from Town's End Restaurant and Bakery in the Embarcadero. Now in our permanent library, these pancakes have become a signature dish for us. I shared the recipe with my friend Renee, who wrote about how they made her a little more tolerant of combining fruit into baked goods in her great blog Every Pot and Pan.

When our Lonesome Whistle Farm bean and grain CSA came with a bag of Scottish oats, I wanted to see if I could use them in this recipes. The original recipe calls for soaking uncooked rolled oats in buttermilk, but I thought these would need a little more softening up, so I mixed in a small amount of boiling water, and then warmed up the buttermilk before soaking (I discovered that microwaved buttermilk separates out, but you can simply stir it back together). This treatment worked great and the final pancakes had just enough bite inside with a lacy, butter crust and delicious toasted pear and almond finish.

Swedish Oatmeal Pancakes with Almonds and Pears
From Town's End Restaurant and Bakery
(makes about 32 pancakes)

2 cups Scottish oats

1/2 cup boiling water

2 cups buttermilk

1/2 cup flour (I used Red Fife Wheat Flour from Lonesome Whistle Farm)

2 Tbsp sugar

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp baking soda

2 eggs, lightly beaten

2 Tbsp melted butter

1 or 2 pears sliced

sliced almonds

1. The night before, put the oats in a large bowl and pour over the boiling water. Mix well. Microwave the buttermilk until warm (it will separate) and add this to the oats. Cover the mixture and let stand until it has cooled, the leave it overnight. If using rolled oars, omit the boiling water step and simply soak the oats in cold buttermilk for 30 minutes or overnight.

2. The next morning , stir the eggs and then the melted butter into the oats.

3. Combine the flour, sugar, baking powder and baking soda in a bowl. Stir the dry ingredients into oats.  You can thin with a Tbsp or two of buttermilk if necessary.

4. Heat a skillet and butter lightly. Use a soup spoon to ladle out pancakes, sprinkling first side with almonds and placing sliced pears on top. Let the pancakes cook until bubble on the edges are stable and they have lost their pale, raw batter appearance. Flip them and cook on second side until the pears have browned. Serve warm with maple syrup.

Other recipes for locally grown grains

Creamy Barley Risotto with Dandelion Greens
Barley Risotto with Grilled Vegetables

Buckwheat Blini

Buckwheat Crepes

Gluten-Free Waffles

Quinoa Salad with Roasted Beets and Kale

Swedish Rye Cookies

Swedish Rye Knäckebröt

Teff Grain and Ricotta Pancakes with Apple Topping

Wheatberry Tabbouleh with Green Beans and Feta

Wheatberries with Snap Peas