The Glutenless Garden: Flapjacks a-la glutenless

So this is kind of a food blog, right? Well not yet, and I have to fix that! So today we have corn pancakes!

I've scrubbed the dirt off my hands, left the daffodils and tulips to the rain, decided not to check on my new sump pump trench, or the clay pack, not participating in any of this scrambling up a ladder hogwash today, no floor sanding tonight, and I've postponed all existential pondering of soil ph, compost, forecast calculations, or alminac reviews.... because.....

IT'S TIME TO COOK!

I bring you the tried and true corn pancake. MY tried and true corn pancake, to be exact. My corn recipes are made only from those things you can get easily at the regular old neighborhood grocer-mart store. They're cheap and they're easy. Cheap glutenlessness is really my biggest goal in all this.

Yay corn! I made these tonight and took lots of pictures so I can set this up like a tutorial. Later I'll explain my "corn base" method, but for now we'll just plow right through. Remember, I'm lucky. If you have allergies to my other ingredients, these recipes are really forgiving. Go ahead and try any of your usual substitutes.

Flapjacks a-la glutenless

EASY peasy lemon squeasy, nothing special needed. One optional 'unusual' ingredient. That's it!

No special tools necessary. If you have a hand blender, great! If not, the spoon is plenty effective. Ugly counter top is also optional.

1/2 tsp Xanthan Gum powder helps a lot. It costs about $10 for a little bag that will last you forever, keep in freezer. If you don't have it, there's just one small adjustment below.

Make 1 serving grits to instructions on packaging, plus 4tsp butter. Heat in large microwavable bowl.

If you have it - Add 1/2 teaspoon Xanthan Gum powder while this is hot, and stir well. (The heat helps reconstitute the powder).

Add two eggs, and 1/4cup sugar and stir. (Here I used brown sugar in the 1/4c size terracotta I keep in the sugar bowl to help prevent hardening and clumps).

Add 1cup corn flour (WATCH your ingredients and allergen statement!! Many innocent looking corn flours are really a 50/50 wheat/corn mix! Hodgson is readily available at stores and has been safe for me. Many others are safe, too. Use logic, if it's right next to a spilled bag of white or wheat flour, it's probably cross contaminated with wheat. Just be careful, ok?)

Add approximately 1 to 1.5 cup milk.

You're looking to get this to a smooth thick liquidy consistency. Corn flours have some variance in absorbency and porousness, so the amount of milk needed does change a bit. This should end up looking just like regular batter from a box of pancake mix does. If you don't have a mixer it can be a bit lumpy and that's nothing to worry about, it won't affect the taste or texture of the end product.

Heat skillet on low, add oil or butter. Here I used oil, butter tastes much better, though. A mix is also great.

Here's the batter poured into the pan, it shows the consistency a bit. This was done with no mixer, so you can see the lumps a bit.

If you used the Xanthan Gum, you can make nice big pancakes. The pan shown is huge, by the way.

If you did not use Xanthan Gum, keep your pancakes to 1/4cup portions or less (otherwise they are way too hard to flip. Xanthan holds the whole deal together, gives it that elastic quality. It's also a good source of fiber, it's a dried tree sap just like Maple syrup candies!)

This pancake is ready to flip - the other was just flipped, they looked the same on the bottom.

You're looking for the edges of the pancake to get firm, and the top of the cake to start to look firm. Bubbles will stay open instead of closing back over.

The best thing to do is some DISHES, that way you're there in the kitchen and can smell them as they get ready and you won't forget them and burn them!

Flip with a metal spatula. The first batch is really hard to scrape free from the pan. Don't be discouraged. To avoid the sticky flip, let the oil heat very thoroughly before putting the batter on.