Sweet Chestnut Flour Pancakes

If you've been reading this blog for awhile, you know that I love chestnuts--all things chestnut. I have been experimenting with using chestnut flour in place of a percentage of regular flour in some of my baked goods, and now I've made pancakes using chestnut flour. I really like the subtle, smoky sweetness of chestnut flour. It adds quite a bit of flavor to recipes.

This recipe is from http://www.celnet.org.uk/. It's super simple to make, just like making a regular pancake batter. For the topping, I sauteed some canned chestnut pieces with some pecans in a bit of butter, just until everything was lightly toasted. I also drizzled on a small amount of maple syrup, and a pinch of powdered sugar. Though the word "sweet" is in the title of this recipe, these pancakes are not really sweet at all on their own as there is very little sugar. (Ahh...I just realized that there is a flour made from water chestnuts, so maybe "sweet" chestnut flour is so named to delineate it from water chestnut flour.)

Sweet Chestnut Flour Pancakes

2 eggs

280 ml milk

1110 g sweet chestnut flour

110 g plain flour

salt, to taste

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

2 tablespoons olive oil

1 teaspoon sugar

Combine all the dry ingredients in a bowl and mix well. Whisk together the eggs and oil in a bowl and add to the dry ingredients. Now add just enough milk to make a somwhat thick batter.

Lightly grease a hot frying pan and then add about 1/4 cup batter for each pancake. Cook on each side until golden brown. Serve with jam, syrup, or lemon and sugar.

In case you're interested in trying chestnut flour, here is the nutritional information:

The nutritional breakdown for chestnut flour:

(Note-this is for a 100 gram serving.)

Calories
371
Calories from Fat
33
Cholesterol
1mg
Sodium
25mg
Total Carbohydrates
78.0g
Dietary Fiber
9.2g
Protein
6.5g

The nutritional breakdown for all-purpose flour:

(Note-this is for a 125 gram serving.)

Calories
455
Calories from Fat
11
Cholesterol
0mg
Sodium
3mg
Total Carbohydrates
95.4g
Dietary Fiber
3.4g
Protein
12.9g