maple•spice: Old-Fashioned Buckwheat Griddle Cakes with Brown Sugar Syrup

So, although I didn't have to make my own birthday cake this year I did make my own birthday breakfast, but, only because I really wanted to try these. Those of you who buy your buckwheat flour here in Ireland or the UK from Dove's Farm may recognize this recipe as it's on the bag :-) After making the buckwheat crêpes and realizing I love buckwheat these were next on the list. I also had some brown sugar syrup left over from the Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookie Granola and thought, hmmm?

These are different from a standard pancake recipe in that they are yeast risen as opposed to using baking powder or soda. This means they need a little forward planning as the batter needs to sit for an hour but, they are worth it. We really loved these but I gotta say what we loved the most was the brown sugar syrup with them! As a true Canadian I like nothing more but copious amounts of real maple syrup on my regular pancakes but it just did not go as well with these as the brown sugar syrup did. Something about the slightly nutty taste of the buckwheat with that pure brown sugar flavour was really lovely together.

Altogether it was a beautiful birthday breakkie and as I now have to make this brown sugar syrup ALL the time as my son won't eat any other cereal but my oatmeal chocolate chip cookie granola, I will certainly be whipping these up again ;-)

Old-Fashioned Buckwheat Griddle Cakes with Brown Sugar Syrup:

200g buckwheat flour

75g golden caster sugar
1/8 tsp salt
1 tsp quick yeast
300ml warm water
1 Tbsp treacle or molasses
50g melted vegan butter

Mix all the dry ingredients together in a large bowl. Measure out the warm water and dissolve the treacle or molasses into it. Stir in to the dry ingredients and leave for 1 hour. It didn't say to leave in a warm place or to cover it but I did, not sure it made any difference though. After an hour stir in the melted butter.

Batter before sitting for 1 hour:

Batter after sitting for 1 hour:

Heat a frying pan and grease with some vegetable oil. Spoon the batter onto the hot pan, I used a 1/4 cup measure for these. I did find this batter quite thin, certainly thinner than my usual basic pancake recipe - just something to keep in mind. When they are golden underneath and bubbling on the surface, carefully flip over and cook the other side. Keep them warm in a low temperature oven until all are cooked.

Brown Sugar Syrup:

500g light muscovado sugar
250ml water

These quantities make quite a lot of syrup, as long as you use half the quantity water to the sugar it will work. I like to make quite a bit as I use it for making the granola as well as for these pancakes. It keeps really well in the fridge, just decant into a nice bottle, easy for pouring.

Simply add the sugar and water to a saucepan and bring to a boil, simmer for 3 - 4 minutes, don't walk away and keep stirring as it can really foam up and over the pan! Remove to another glass container to cool and thicken. It won't seem "syrupy" right away but will thicken up like a syrup as it cools. You could make this while the batter is resting as it would certainly be ready after the hour.

If using from the fridge, you'll want to warm it up, a really handy way to do this is just place the whole bottle in some warm water until heated. Otherwise you can decant some into a smaller jug and microwave briefly.