Savoury Sourdough Bread Batter Pancakes

"What shall I make for dinner ?"That is always a burning question on my mind,  when I am driving home for work. I always love to have breakfast for dinner....today I remembered, that I still have the sour dough starter in my fridge. I thought I will try something new today..... Savory pancakes from sourdough bread batter...
Yum, sounds good !!I came home and quickly took the sour dough starter out of fridge and fed it.

Ingredients to feed the starter:

• Sourdough starter 3 cups
• 2 cups of AP flour
• 2 tablespoons yeast
• 4 cups of warm water

Method to feed the starter:

• Preheat oven and 200* F and turn it off when preheated to about 150 * F
• Mix flour, water and yeast until all the lumps in batter are gone.
• Transfer in a stainless steel bowl and place it in the warm oven for 1-2 hours with light one in the oven.
•  In the mean time prepare sauces and cilantro pesto or raita to serve the pancakes with.

I used following condiments/sauces to serve with  the pancakes:

• Ready made mango chili sauce, Ketchup,
• Jalapeno sauce, Sweet Maggie chili sauce, Garlic chili sauce from chines store.
• Habenero sauce which I had made few days ago (recipe on this blog)
• You can also serve these pancakes with Cucumber Raita (recipe on this blog) or any other raitas (several recipes on this blog) and side of seasonal fruits like mangoes, pineapple or papaya.

Ingredients for Pancakes:

• 4 cups of sourdough bread batter made from the starter (as above)
• 1 cup of cream of wheat
• 1/2 cup of Besan (graham flour, or you can use soya flour or ragi flour)
• 1  cup of rice flour
• 1 bunch of green onions
• 1 bunch of fresh Cilantro

• 2-3 serrano peppers of 1-2 Jalapeno peppers or  to taste (I used frozen finely ground paste that I had in my freezer)
• 1/4 teaspoon of asefeotida
• 1 and half teaspoon of salt or to taste
• 1/2 teaspoon of turmeric powder
• 2 cups of water.
• Olive oil or any cooking vegetable oil to drizzle on pancakes when making them on griddle.

Method to make batter for pancake:

• Wash and finely chop green onions, cilantro and fresh jalapenos or Serrano peppers.
• Mix Besan, Cream of wheat and rice flour with the sour dough bread batter.
• Add chopped onions, cilantro and fresh finely chopped chili peppers.

• Add salt, asefoetida and turmeric powder.
• Add water and mix batter to consistency little more dilute than your traditional American pancakes so you can spread it thinner on a griddle.

How to make pancakes on griddle: 

• I usually use Circulon brand griddle.  Pancakes don't stick to them and you don't have to use much oil.
• Heat the griddle on medium high heat.
• Drizzle some olive oil or any vegetable oil.
• Take a paper towel, or small piece of muslin cloth and  wet is  with water and carefully wipe the oil on the griddle in circular pattern.
• Save the cloth or wet paper towel as you will be repeating this process as described later.

• Pour one big ladle of pancake batter in middle of hot griddle and with back of ladle spread it in circular manner.
• First pancake always come out a little thicker as you get use to spreading it on the griddle, but as you get use to it and the temperature of griddle is right, you will see yourself reach perfection as you make subsequent pancakes.

• Now drizzle oil on round edge of pancake and on top of it and let it cook for 1-2 min on medium high heat.
• When you see edges of pancake becoming golden brown, slowly flip it with spatula.
• Cook the other side of pancake on medium high heat, pressing it lightly with spatula.
• Cooking time will depend on how thick of thin the pancake you have spread on the griddle.
•  Once cooked on both side to desired crispness, fold it in to a roll and serve hot with desired side of sauces or raitas.

• Once one pancake is cooked, I always take the hot griddle under hot running water carefully, so the temperature of griddle comes down a little.
• Return it to the stove and again wipe it clean with the saved wet paper towel or wet muslin cloth. 
• Then pour another ladle of batter and continue to make the pancakes as before.
• Serve them hot with desired side of sauces, relishes, raitas or chutneys.

• If you don't have sour dough starter, you can make batter from a ready made sourdough or any  bread mix, if you are not crazy about sourdough bread like I am :)
• I have posted several photos of pancake making process...Enjoy :)
• This recipe yields about 12 pancakes. You can save the unused  batter in fridge for next day,  just take it out of fridge few hours before making them again.

As I mentioned earlier, I used following condiments/sides to server the pancakes with:

• Ready made mango chili sauce, Ketchup,
• Jalapeno sauce, Sweet Maggie chili sauce, Gralic chili sauce from chines store.
• Habenero sauce which I had mad few days ago (recipe on this blog)
• You can also serve these with Cucumber Raita (recipe on this blog) or any other raitas of chutneys.
• I served with fresh pineapple.

Recipe and Photographs by Surekha.