Dutch Baby Apple Pancakes (Apple Pannekoeken)

Thick or thin, these pancakes are a great way to start or end a weekend. This was my first time experimenting with my small (5 inch) cast iron skillet. The first one I made was quite thick, so it took quite a while to bake. The second one was thinner.

One of my favorite things about these pancakes (which is basically everything), is the caramelized crispy edge. In the middle it's soft and crunchy with the apples, but around the edge it's so wonderfully crunchy and sweet, so there's a variety of textures going on.

The original recipe is from Sorted Food: https://sortedfood.com/recipe/appledutchbaby

The recipe is here and there are more pictures of the process below.

Ingredients:

Apples:

• 2 red eating apples (e.g. Gala)

• 2 tbsp unsalted butter

• 2 tbsp sugar

• 1/2 tsp. cinnamon

Pancakes

• 3 eggs

• ¾ cup milk

• 1 tsp vanilla extract

• 2/3 cup self-raising flour

Serving

• 1 big scoop vanilla ice cream or whipped cream

Directions:

1. Preheat the oven to 425ºF.

2. Batter: Combine the eggs, milk and vanilla in a bowl. Add in the flour and cinnamon, then whisk well to a smooth batter.

3. Peel, quarter and core the apples then slice them into 1cm thick wedges. Heat the butter over a medium heat in the 5” cast-iron pan until melted and foaming. Add enough apple slices to just cover the base of the pan and cook for a minute or so. Sprinkle over a little sugar, turn the apple wedges over and cook for another minute until the apples are golden brown.

4. Pour 1/2 cup of batter over the apples, or more for a thicker pancake. Place the pan in the oven and bake for 20-30 minutes, or until risen, puffy and golden brown around the edges.

5. Take the Dutch baby from the oven and quickly add a big scoop of ice cream. Drizzle over the salted caramel sauce and dust with icing sugar. Makes 4 pancakes.

Apples sizzling away in butter, sugar, and cinnamon.

Added batter and in the oven it goes!

This was the first try, it made a thicker pancake because I didn't know how much batter should go in. Still turned out lovely, but a bit chewy in some parts.

Just look at that lovely crispy edge around the thicker pancake.

And the crispy edges of the thinner pancake!