Breakfast Debate Redux: Oven-Baked Pancakes with Fruit Topping

If you read about the ongoing saga of our holidaybreakfasts, you may recall that I’ve gone through many, many recipes in an effort to please everyone - and poison no-one - on Christmas morning. Mostly I’ve given up. Now my main goal is to avoid anyone feeling the need to cry during breakfast. We were feeling a little hashed-out (and John really, really hates sweet potatoes right now) so it was back to square one this year, with a cookbook that I acquired at some point in the distant past which contains nothing except breakfast recipes. It seemed like a reasonable starting point; surely, with "Hundreds of divine recipes to take you to breakfast paradise!" even we could find something that would make everyone happy. Also, I can't resist cookbook hyperbole.

The recent availability of a wider assortment of GF flour blends on the grocery store shelves has made me a little giddy. Granted, we can’t eat most of them – but we can eat some, and the presence of a Costco-sized bag of Namaste brand GF flour blend in my pantry has been a big incentive to try baking again. (Most of these recent experiments could be used to prop open a heavy door, but I continue to sally forth undaunted....) Our favorite local bakery has also started selling their rice flour blend by the pound, so this seemed like a good year to dive back into flour-based breakfast recipes. 

We ended up with the usual sparkling juice and fruit and Canadian bacon (“Is it ham? Is it bacon? It’s….hacon!” announced John), plus these ridiculously easy baked pancakes, which might possibly be realistic for an organized weekday morning though I'm making no promises out loud. Don’t skip the fruit topping, which is utterly fantastic on this (and waffles and buckwheat pancakes - with a little whipped cream – OMG, really so, so good). I had to make a second batch and we all ate until we were too full to move. And nobody cried until we watched “Frozen.” Breakfast success! 

Oven-Baked Pancakes with Fruit Topping

3 eggs

½ cup of your favorite GF flour mix (or flour, if you're so inclined)

½ cup of your favorite non-dairy milk substitute (or, you know, milk)

2 tbsp non-dairy fake margarine scary stuff, melted. (If you can use butter instead, do!)

Generous pinch of salt

Finely grated zest of half a lemon

Powdered sugar, for serving

Preheat the oven to 400. Spray 2 9-inch pie pans with cooking spray.

Beat the eggs in a mixing bowl until light and frothy. Add the flour, a couple of tablespoons at a time, and mix well after each addition. Beat in the remaining ingredients.

Pour the batter into the pie pans, dividing it evenly, and bake for 10 minutes. Reduce the heat to 350 and bake for another 5 minutes.

Remove the pans from the oven, sprinkle with powdered sugar even though you’re about to put fruit on top of this, and serve immediately. It's not overkill if it's Christmas. 

Peach-Raspberry Compote

1 cup raspberries

3-4 fresh peaches, pitted and chopped

½ cup sugar

1 cinnamon stick

Grated zest and juice of 1 orange

2 tbsp ruby port

1 tsp vanilla extract

Put the fruit, sugar, cinnamon, zest, and juice into a medium saucepan. Add enough water to mostly cover the fruit and bring to a boil. Reduce the heat and cook until the fruit is very soft and the water is mostly gone (the raspberries will pretty much disintegrate and the peaches will break down).

When the sauce is reduced, remove the cinnamon stick and stir in the port and vanilla. This is good served warm or cold, but I don’t recommend taste-testing as soon as you take it off the stove because you’ll burn your tongue and set a bad example for your kids.

Keeps for a week in the fridge if you hide the leftovers from the rest of the family.