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Why should you make pannekoeken?
Everyone likes them–and they are so darned fun. They’re dramatic and it’s nice to show off once in a while. “How do you make them rise like that?”
It looks impossible. Look how far above the pan they rise–a gigantic bowl!
And it’s all steam–no leavening. The wet batter in a hot pan expands to climb the sides of the pan–eight inches or more above the rim.
When we serve them in our test kitchen, we line up maybe a dozen kinds of syrup and let folks put syrup on them like pancakes. I like them with fruit. The peach one shown here is drizzled with caramelly buttermilk syrup. 
What about a Pan?
It does take the right pan. We love our dedicated pans and have sold several thousand of them.
It takes a rounded pan, something without an abrupt transition from the bottom to the sides. A straight-sided pan catches the pannekoeken as it expands and stops the spread. It has to have a very good nonstick surface, so that the batter slides across it as it cooks.
If you have a well-rounded, nonstick pan, give it a try. An eleven inch pan works for a three egg pannekoeken and a nine inch for a two egg pannekoeken.
If you don’t have such pan, consider one of ours.
Don’t miss this crazy pannekoeken deal!
Get the pan for $25. We’ll add two free large pannekoeken mixes that each make nine 12-inch pannekoeken. Then we’ll add two syrup mixes for six cups of buttermilk syrup.
That’s $23 in freebies!
Get the pan and $23 in freebies for only $25.
More Ways to Serve Them
There are countless ways to make them.
In a waiting room the other day, I was reading a food magazine that listed the ten best restaurant breakfasts in America. One was a pannekoeken served with cheese and something I didn’t understand. A few google searches turned up a hard Italian sausage of some kind. Interesting.
In the Midwest there is a chain of pannekoeken restaurants that serves them breakfast, noon, and dinner. We visited them often when we lived in Minnesota. Look what they had on their menu:
Rotterdam Pannekoeken
Made with gouda cheese, green peppers, onions, mushrooms and a choice of meats. Topped with fresh tomato slices and hollandaise sauce.
Meat and Vegetable Pannekoeken
Made with green peppers, onions, mushrooms, broccoli, water chestnuts, peapods, and a choice of ham or bacon. Topped with gouda and cheddar cheese.
Dutch Pot Pie Pannekoeken
Made with vegetables, turkey, and mashed potatoes. Topped with gouda and cheddar cheese. Served with brown gravy.
Fresh Vegetable Pannekoeken
Made with green peppers, onions, mushrooms, broccoli, water chestnuts, peapods, and tomatoes. Topped with gouda and cheddar cheese.
Shepard’s Pie Pannekoeken
Filled with green peppers, onions, black olives, mushrooms, and ground beef. Topped with mashed potatoes, gouda, and cheddar cheese. Served with brown gravy.
Southwest Pannekoeken
Filled with taco-seasoned ground beef and cheeses. Topped with diced tomatoes, onions, green peppers, black olives, and tortilla chips. Served with sour cream and salsa.
After we started this business, we called the Pannekoeken Huis in Maplewood, Minnesota, and asked for the manager.
(Maplewood is a northern suburb of the Twin Cities. There are three other Pannekoeken Huis restaurants in the Twin Cities.)
Derek Moberg is the manager of the Pannekoeken Huis in Maplewood, Minnesota. Derek is friendly, quiet spoken, and helpful.
“The recipe for the batter is secret,” said Derek. But he continued to talk, telling us what was popular and giving us tips.
“We only bake them for eight to eleven minutes,” Derek explained.
We had been baking them for longer than that at the time. We reduced the time—but not that much–and yes, they were just fine, maybe better.
Derek explained that they make pannekoeken with fruit in two ways: either baking the fruit right into the pannekoeken or cooking the fruit and putting it on top. We tried both ways and they were great. At the restaurant, they often cook the pannekoeken according to the desires of the customer, with fruit on top or cooked in. We found that with apple pannekoeken, if you cook the apples into the pannekoeken, they need to be thinly sliced so that they are cooked adequately.
“Derek, what’s your most popular pannekoeken,” we asked.
“Apple pannekoeken cooked with brown sugar. Our second most popular is a fresh strawberry pannekoeken made with a sweetened sour cream filling.”
I told Derek how much we enjoyed the restaurant’s dinner pannekoeken, the savory pannekoeken. He explained that they still made them and they were popular.
We still serve them with syrup or syrup and fruit. But The Pannekoeken Huis has been the inspiration for many a pannekoeken.
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About the Author
Dennis Weaver has burned food from Point Barrow, Alaska, to Miami, Florida. He is the founder of The Prepared Pantry in Rigby, Idaho and the author of How to Bake: The Art and Science of Baking available as an E-book or as a Kindle book on Amazon.
Dennis lives in Rigby, Idaho, with his wife, Merri Ann. They have five wonderful children and five beautiful granddaughters.