From your view it must look like all I cook is breakfast and brunch food. Cheddar, Strawberry Crème Fraiche Biscuits; how I use my ‘one cup’ rule to make just enough Fry Bakes for my single life cooking; Shakshuka for hosting brunch at home for friends and Lavender Maple Syrup for simple French Toast. If you worked as much as I do Monday through Friday, you too would jump out the bed on weekends with joy to eat a delicious home cooked meal – starting with breakfast. And perhaps the quietness of the early morning leaves room for my culinary creativity to speak loudly through plates of warm breakfast toast and teas. Or the soft baby-like cries of my landlord’s cats as they lay in the garden outside my kitchen window waiting to be fed. Standing at the window with hot tea in hand this scene makes me chuckle – they so greedy. And the light! Yes, the sunlight peeking through my windows illuminating gold as they hit my curtains forming the most relaxing atmosphere to cook a delicious something to showcase my love.
There are days where I leave my job on Friday nights and tiredly head for the grocery store to pick up essentials to cook breakfast on the weekends before that burst of energy leaves my body, and like a zombie head back to bed for most of the day. This weekend however, I planned on being much contended eating cereal. Yup, low-sugar, no fuss cereal eaten with warm and cold coconut or almond milk. Anything for my kitchen to remain spotless. Until my niece sends me a self-invitation to breakfast that said “Aunty, I dreamed you made me sweet plantain pancakes!” With breakfast challenges like that how can I deny the child the ability to live out her dream? She described that in her dreams the not too sweet pancakes were topped with a syrup of warm tropical fruit. Ha, at this point the depiction felt less like a dream and more like a Jedi mind trick. But I’m powerless to her as I get into mommy mode when she comes over, making sure my sister’s first born is happy and well fed.
If you are like me–trini to the bone, then most likely you are always stocked with sweet plantains. Boiled, fried or eaten with other starchy ground provisions topped with heavy meat and fish stews, yeah I got to have it! Again, if you are like me, then your sweet plantains get over-ripe faster than you can eat them. And yes, they taste delicious fried once their skin turns black, but I was excited to cook them in a way I’ve never done. That excitement stayed with me from that Wednesday when we texted until Sunday morning when I set out to make Sweet Plantain Pancakes.
Note:
– I make breakfast all the time for myself on weekends and followed my Coconut Milk Pancake recipe. Doubling the amount of ingredients to serve two.
– I wanted to extract the most flavor out of the sweet plantains, so I boiled then mashed them to add to the pancake batter. Adding a sprinkle of sugar to help bring the flavor out more.
– Sweet plantains are starchy so I tried not to over mash them and added them last to the batter.
– Instead of maple or pancake syrup, following my niece’s dream I made an easy fruit compote with frozen pineapples, mangoes, sugar, a dash of rum and vanilla bean.
– Sift your dry ingredients
– I used coconut milk but you can use whole milk
How to boil plantains: Rinse first. Leaving the skins on, cut both ends of the plantains then slice in half. In a medium sauce pot, add the plantains and enough cold water to cover them. Cook covered and bring to a rolling boil until the skins split and the plantains tender yellow flesh is exposed. Allow to cool before mashing.
Tropical Fruit Compote: 1/1/2 cups of both frozen pineapples, mangoes, 1 Tbsp of sugar, 1 cinnamon stick, and 3/4 cups of dark rum. In a small sauce pan, bring to boil then reduce to simmer. Cook on low for 12-15 minutes occasionally mashing the fruit with a wooden spoon to combine.
2 cups All-Purpose Flour
4 Tbsp. of Sugar
3 tsp of Baking Powder
2 Eggs
3 cups of Coconut Milk
4 Tbsp. of melted Butter, unsalted
1/2 tsp of Vanilla Extract
2 cups of mashed Sweet Plantains
In a medium mixing bowl, sift flour, baking powder and sugar. Make a well in the center and pour in the milk, egg and melted butter; mix until smooth. Mix in the mashed sweet plantains and allow to rest for about 10-15 minutes
Heat a lightly oiled griddle or frying pan over medium high heat. Pour or scoop the batter onto the griddle, using approximately 1/2 cup for each pancake. Brown on both sides and serve hot with fruit compote and toasted sliced almonds.
