Pan Cake

Another basic  from scratch recipe. Pan cakes are one of the kids favourite breakfast. As the name says its all the same ingredients as you make a cake , but different measures made in a pan.

All purpose flour - 1 cup
sugar - 2 tbsp
baking powder - 2 tsp
a small pinch of salt.

egg -1
butter - 2 tbsp
milk - 1 cup
vanilla essence - 1/2 tsp


Mix flour, sugar, baking powder and salt (all dry ingredients) in a bowl.
In another cup or bowl mix milk,egg and melted butter and vanilla essence(all wet ingredients).
Pour the wet into the dry ingredients and mix.
Do not over mix them, only until every thing is just mixed in, small lumpy mix is good.
Heat a pan in medium heat. Pour a ladle of batter. Flip when you see lot of bubbles. A few more seconds on the other side and done.
Serve with maple syrup, breakfast syrup or honey,fruits  and/or whipped cream as you wish.

This is the basic pancake. You can add blue berries or chocolate chips to the batter.

note: some flours absorb more water. If you feel its too thick and is hard to pour add a little more milk. But not more than 1/4 more cup for this quantity.

Variations :

Butter milk pancake :
Above one is a typical pancake, if you like to have a fluffier one, go for the butter milk pancakes, In that we will use butter milk and baking soda, instead of milk and baking powder. [ For the above quantity replace by 1 cup of butter milk and 1 tsp baking soda]

Healthier:
You can make it more healthy by adding half all purpose flour and half whole wheat flour.

Add chocolate chips or bananas or blueberries to the batter to make the respective pancakes.

Mac and Cheese

Mac and cheese is very easy to make from scratch. You don't need the box any more. Almost all kids love it. Below is the recipe for it.

Macaroni pasta(elbow pasta) - 1/2 lb ( you can actually use any small pasta)
butter - 2 tbsp.
all purpose flour - 2 tbsp
milk - 2 cups
cheddar cheese -  1 to 1 1/2 cups grated
salt and pepper

Boil water in a large pan with a little salt. Add the dry pasta and boil for about 10 minutes or until cooked. Drain and keep.

In a heavy bottom pan add 2 tbsp. of butter. Keep the flame low. When its melted add the flour and keep stirring until it slightly changes colour.

Keep stirring and slowly add milk and mix until nice and smooth. A whisk will do a better job.

Now bring the flame to medium and let it boil, stirring occasionally. After it boils, add grated cheese, salt and pepper,(cheese has salt so add very less). Once its nicely blended add the cooked pasta.
Mix it in and let it heat through for 2 minutes. Done.

You can add cooked chopped vegetables or chicken into it if desired.