Kefir Pancakes

This recipe is another house favorite and is super easy to make for Sunday breakfast. The pancakes come out fluffy and literally melt in your mouth.

Ingredients:

  • 1 2/3 cups of flour
  • 1 2/3 cups of plain kefir
  • 2 tablespoons of sugar (I used coconut sugar used in this recipe)
  • 2 teaspoons of baking powder
  • 1/2 teaspoon of baking soda
  • 1 teaspoon of salt
  • 1 egg
  • 1/2 tablespoons of lemon juice
  • 2 tablespoons of sunflower oil

Process:

First turn on your oven to 350F. In a bowl add together all of the dry ingredients:

2016-09-25-06-46-24

Mix well so that all are evenly combined and add all the wet ingredients:

2016-09-25-06-55-29

Mix to combine just enough. I.e. as soon as you see that all the flour was incorporated walk away, and stop mixing. If you continue you will get more and more gluten developed and pancakes will come out rubbery. It’s ok if mixture a little bit lumpy:

2016-09-25-06-57-42

Heat up your favorite skillet (mine is cast iron) with enough sunflower oil to cover the bottom on medium low heat. Using your favorite spoon (I use 3 tablespoons ice-cream scoop) pour batter onto the skillet:

2016-09-25-07-00-05

Once brown on one side flip them over:

2016-09-25-07-05-02

Once the other side is golden brown as well take them off put on a parchment paper lined baking sheet and put them into preheated oven for about 5 to 8 minutes. You can skip this step if you want but I feel it’s necessary to make the baking power work to it’s full potential. Repeat with another batch of batter. You can also add blueberries right after you put batter for the second batch:

2016-09-25-07-09-02

When you are ready to serve them, get some honey and mix it with about tablespoon of lemon juice:

2016-09-25-07-23-20

Enjoy!

Shakshuka with Italian Sausage and Mozarella

This is often a great protein packed breakfast entry that is super easy to make and is very filling. Different people in my family call this differently, the result dish is the same. It’s a mixture of fresh tomatoes, fresh bell pepper, garlic and eggs baked in the oven. In this specific recipe I also used Italian sausage to add more protein to the dish and it turned out quite well.

Ingredients:

  • 3 Italian sausages
  • 5 small to medium campari tomatoes
  • 1 red bell pepper
  • 2 cloves of garlic
  • 1/2 cup of cilantro
  • 4-5 slices of fresh mozzarella

Process:

Warm up your oven to 350F. Heat up a cast iron skillet, then turn down to a medium-low heat and spray with olive oil. Put the Italian sausage and cover with lid. Let it sear on both sides so that the casing is already firm and the sausage is almost cooked through. Meantime slice the tomatoes and pepper into the bite size pieces. Next, open the lid and slice the sausage directly on the skillet to 1″ thick pieces. Add tomatoes and pepper, mix with sausage and season with salt. Close the lid and let it simmer for about 10 minutes. Next add six eggs and season them with salt and sprinkle chopped cilantro on top, put it into the oven:

2016-09-20-08-00-19

About 5 minutes after put slices of mozzarella on top of the shamshuka and bake for another 5 minutes or so or until the cheese melts:

2016-09-20-08-06-09

It’s now ready to serve. Enjoy!