Plus, this post is going to be about MULTIPLE resolutions at once. I win at ... something.
Anyway. When last we spoke, I mentioned a bunch of "guidelines" that I set for myself for this year and I am happy to report that I have been hard at work at #5 especially. Now that I have a semi-regular schedule (i.e., I work most days and am almost always home by 4:00, so I have time to make "real" dinner instead of just throwing random assorted frozen things on the table), I have been trying to expand my repertoire in the kitchen. I mean, I think I'm a pretty good cook anyway, but it never hurts to improve.
This means -- pretty much as I predicted -- that I'm experimenting a lot more frequently with recipes I find on Pinterest. And so far, I've found one that has been an absolute, unqualified slam dunk, and so I am sharing it here.
But first (OF COURSE), a story, which begins thusly: I just CAN'T with pancakes.
I mean, I love pancakes. LOVE THEM. That's the problem. One is never enough. Three are usually not enough. Add in butter, syrup, etc., and I end up feeling fluffy and sluggish for the whole day. (Carbs!) But I love them, and my daughter and husband love them, and I feel so ... difficult when I make them for everyone else, but don't eat them myself. Difficult, and sad. Everyone else has a plate full of golden-brown hotcake deliciousness in front of them, and I'm eating a sad little serving of scrambled eggs.
Enter the cream cheese crȇpe.
This recipe has been floating around Pinterest for a while, usually under something like "low-carb pancakes." I tend to stay away from recipes like that, because many low-carb recipes out there contain ingredients I can't eat or don't like -- almond flour (allergic), coconut oil (not worth the cost, I don't think), Stevia (ick), erythritol (what?). But I found one that has two ingredients, both of which I (1) recognize and (2) have in my house.
Cream cheese and eggs. That's it. WHAT?
Believe it or not: these are GOOD. I don't know what kind of culinary alchemy makes cream cheese and eggs (plus a little bit of vanilla extract, which I add, because I never follow recipes exactly) turn into something that tastes almost exactly like pancakes when you pour the batter out of a blender, but HELLO LOVER.
I made these for the first time about a week ago, and they were good. I was not 100% satisifed with how they turned out -- I had trouble getting them to come out "pretty" -- but they tasted fine, and instead of syrup, I only needed a little bit of topping. In that first batch, I only used three half-teaspoons of blueberry preserves (half a teaspoon on top of each crȇpe), and it was enough.
But, as I said, I wasn't completely sold. They were good enough, but not perfect. Something wasn't quite right. I needed a second taster to try these and guess what was wrong with them, or tell me I was bananas for liking them so much, or something.
We tried them again this morning, and this time they were an unqualified success. My husband declared this recipe "a keeper" -- and I'll agree, especially because I figured out what was wrong with the last batch.
Here's the recipe: 3 ounces of softened cream cheese (lowfat cream cheese [American Neufchâtel] will work just fine) and 3 large eggs (or equivalent -- I used 2 medium eggs and 1/3 cup Egg Beaters). That's all. I added about 1/4 teaspoon of vanilla extract, but you don't need to. Mix in a blender or Magic Bullet-type device, then pour onto a heated griddle or skillet. You'll get 6-8 crȇpes from this recipe, depending on how big you make them. They'll be thin -- they're crȇpes, after all -- but they taste like pancakes (somehow!) and satisfy that craving. I don't know how, but they do. Magic, maybe?
When I made this batch, I put about half a teaspoon of preserves in the middle of each crȇpe and then rolled them up, with a little extra of the top, and a squirt of whipped cream to look pretty. They tasted AMAZING, even better than last time, when I used all Egg Beaters.
And now I can have pancakes with everyone else. THE END.
