Squashed!

Oh, you guys!  I have been remiss in telling you all about my fun holidays!  But things have just been so, so busy!  I will revere* you with such tales in the coming weeks** but let’s just say that my birthday, Christmas, New Year’s Eve sure did sashay right by in a blur of joy and giggles and peppermint and bubbles and cheese…I hope you and yours had as much good cheer as me and mine did.  And that your 2012 is off and running in the most amazing start.

The last few weeks have been all about gourds and bourbon around here at bacibug headquarters.  I mean, let’s be honest:  I’m hard pressed to run up against a squash or a whiskey I don’t like.  It’s true.  So when the good people of O Organics sent me their Butternut Squash soup to sample, how could I resist?  I could not!  O Organics is the private label of the Safeway and Vons team, and they have created an environmentally responsible brand and package and I’ll tell you what:  I have long-loved my soups and broths and stocks in a box.  That’s all I keep in my pantry.  Canned soup is so two thousand LATE, you guys.  I mean really.

And I love soup!  It was my intention to eat some of this O Organics Butternut Squash soup as a regular old restorative bowl of soup after all of the holiday hedonism, and then use the rest of it to make a butternut squash risotto, but I never got that far.  Because, as so many of you know, I also love a pancake.  Specifically a miniature, silver dollar-ish pancake.  I love little lemon pancakes, I love little cinnamon pancakes, I love little pumpkin pancakes.  And guess what this little box of soup came with***?  A recipe for butternut squash pancakes!  Sign me up, internet!  So I marched over to my friends Erin and Greg’s where I would have a house full of discriminating testers and tasters**** of all ages and a huge, bad-ass professional griddle*****, and I got down to business!

These pancakes are so good, you guys!  They’re dense and fluffy at the same time, and have a hint of cinnamon and a natural sweetness from the butternut squash soup.  And let’s be fair…any way I can get a vegetable in the daily routine is the right way for me.  We were so virtuous about it, too…we didn’t even drink mimosas with them!  Maybe next time.  They were hearty without being heavy and really made me feel like I’d started the day right.  You should make them, you guys!  Or just come over!  I’m totally adding them to my brunch repertoire…you know I love to flap some jacks for the people I love.

Butternut Squash Pancakes with Pecan-Maple Sauce

     Adapted from O Organics

     Makes 16 regular sized pancakes

     (I used a mini-scoop and made them silver dollar size so it made more like 30.  Or a million.)

3 cups all-purpose flour

¼ cup sugar

½ tsp salt

1 TBSP baking powder

1 tsp cinnamon

2 ¼ cups butternut squash soup

4 large eggs

1 tsp vanilla extract

1 cup milk

Butter for pan or griddle

Pecan-Maple Sauce

2 TBSP butter

½ cup chopped pecans

½ cup maple syrup

For pancakes:

1.       In one bowl, whisk together top 5 dry ingredients.

2.       In a separate bowl, whisk together the butternut squash soup, eggs, vanilla and milk. 

3.       Add wet ingredients to dry ingredients and stir until just combined; let rest for 10 minutes while you heat a non-stick pan or griddle.

4.        Brush heated pan or griddle lightly with butter and add ¼ cup of pancake batter.  Cook until bubbles form and edges begin to brown.  Flip and cook for about 1 minute more.

5.       Drizzle with Pecan-Maple sauce and gobble!

For sauce:

In a small saucepan over medium heat, melt butter and add pecans.  When the butter just starts to sizzle, add syrup and cook until is just starts to bubble; remove from heat.

*Bore.

**I wore a saucy little lady hat to New Year’s Eve…so fun, you guys!



See?  Saucy!



***Hint: NOT one million dollars.

****”I will eat them if you let me flip them!”—Ella Mae, age 6

*****I love that thing…I feel like Mel Sharples!