Apple Pancakes

Was back late last week from a week long holiday to attend a big fat Indian wedding of two buddies and since then I've hardly spent any time in the kitchen (read that as experimenting), barring the necessity cooking. Thanks to a bad stomach, I did enough and more justice to plain khichdi, south indian rasam and curd rice for four days!! When I awoke on Tue morning, it was with a sense of loss and deprivation. Four days of my life had passed by with bland food! Even before I was out of my bed, my mind had conjured up images of exotic food that I wanted for breakfast.

As I rummaged through the contents of the kitchen cabinet, I winced. Everything in there seemed to cry out "Take me and make a South indian breakfast." I shut the door without wanting to hear another voice and went to the refrigerator. I found fruits (plenty of it too) and 2 eggs. Omlettes.. Egg muffins.. Scrambled eggs.. Smoothie.. As I was thinking this, my eyes fell on the maple syrup lying unused and its when I decided breakfast would be hot fruity pancakes with maple syrup!!! Hmm .. Hot apply pancakes actually..

I love pancakes and yes, in all its variations! American, Banana (my favorite), Lemon, Apple, Orange, the list could go on. The first time I tasted the Westerner's version of  pancakes was when Mug and I were in Andaman. The breakfast menu at the resort had banana pancakes and I clearly remember, there was not a day in the entire week that we stayed there, that we didn't have these goodies for breakfast. To date, its been the best we've had!! Since we can't go to the Andaman every time he/I want to eat a good pancake, I decided to learn to make these goodies and have experimented different varieties pancakes at home (once with oats too which I shall not talk about in public :D)

So without further blah blah's, here are the details of another experiment. The recipe wasn't taken off any published source. Based on how I had made pancakes a few months ago, I just eyeballed measurements to get the batter ready. 

Ingredients

1 apple peeled, cored and sliced into small 1/2 inch pieces

1 tbsp sugar (check the sweetness of the apple before you add )

1 tbsp water

1/2 tsp all spice powder

3/4 cup all purpose flour (maida)

2 pinches baking powder

1 pinch salt

1 cup milk

2 eggs

Method
In a heavy saucepan, cook the apple, sugar and water till the apple pieces are translucent. This should take about 4-5 minutes. Keep stirring to ensure you don't land up with burnt apples! Add the all spice powder just before removing from fire. Let it cool for a few minutes.
At this juncture, you may choose to puree the apples for the pancake batter which will give it a more uniform taste OR just mash the apples slightly so you can get crunchy bits as you eat. 
In a bowl, beat the eggs lightly. Add milk and whisk. Keep aside.
In a separate large bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder and salt.

Make a well in the center and pour in the milk & egg mixture. 
Add the apple puree / pieces.  Mix it all together.
Heat a lightly buttered griddle/ pan. Pour the batter onto the griddle in the center, using approximately 1 ladle for each pancake. Spread around. Cook on both sides. 
Serve hot topped with pancake / maple syrup.