I have been trying to somewhat limit my trips to the store lately. The less time I spend in retail establishments, the less money I spend! I know that I’ll be in town on Wednesday when I go for my MOPS meeting, so that is when I’ve planned my grocery shopping trip for.
Meanwhile, we are starting to run out of a few things. We are down to about a 1/2 gallon of milk and 3 eggs. When the kids got up this morning I saw that the cold cereal was also running low. I just didn’t know what to do for breakfast. I didn’t want to make scrambled eggs and I didn’t feel like cooking up any oatmeal. So I finally I decided to make pancakes.
Much like I discussed on “Waffle Day” I like to make a double batch when I make pancakes and freeze the extras for quick breakfasts later. I use the recipe right out of good old “Betty Crocker”, with the minor addition of vanilla extract.
I discovered a few months ago that by reusing an old ketchup bottle I could make pancakes quickly and with a lot less mess. I mix up the batter in my stand mixer then, using a funnel, I pour it into the large ketchup bottle. I was able to fit almost the entire double batch in at one time. Using the bottle I have easy control over where the batter goes. I can make a series of small pancakes on my griddle with no drips at all!
After everyone ate their fill of pancakes, the extras were cooled on wire racks, then layered on a cookie sheet with wax paper in between and placed in my big freezer. In a couple of hours I’ll be able to throw them all in a large zippered freezer bag and put it in the refridgerator freezer. Easy breakfasts for the next week or so!
{ 7 comments… read them below or add one }
Great idea! I will have to save our next empty ketchup bottle. My son loves pancakes.
what a cool idea!! I’m going to try that!
i love the squeeze bottle idea. i love having extra things frozen, it is such a present to go looking in the freezer and find frozen beans, a muffin batter, and summers hand-picked wild berries! i shall try the pancakes.
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Glad you all like the idea. I was pretty darn impressed with myself when I figured that little trick out.
How long could the batter be saved in the ketchup bottle, a week? Its got eggs and milk in it so I figure a week at most.
Kodijack-I’ve never actually stored the pancake batter that way. I just make a double batch in one morning (using the ketchup bottle to make pouring easier and drip free) and then freeze them. According to the information I found online, storing batter for longer than 12 hours can cause the finished pancakes to not be as puffy and to be tough. This is the actual link.
http://www.continentalmills.com/brands/krusteaz/faq_central/Pancake__Waffle_Mixes/#FAQ_3
If you want to do a sort of “instant pancake breakfast” idea, you could take the ketchup bottle, measure all the dry ingredients into it, then you could add the milk in and mark the level the milk comes to with a permenant marker on the outside of the bottle. Then add your eggs (slightly scrambled first) then all you have to do is shake it well and pour. After that first time making pancakes will be easy-In the future you can always measure the dry ingredients into the bottle then leave it in your pantry, and when you want to make pancakes you can fill it up to the line with milk (since you measured it that one time) add the eggs, shake and go.
dainty! *-). Thanks for sharing