something berry special

Jack Monroe’s fluffy berry pancakes.

“These are a favourite of my small boy, and something of a lazy Sunday tradition,” says cook and activist, Jack Monroe.

“We loaf around with all the breakfast we can possibly manage. Breakfast rolls into lunch, into walks, into movies, into catching up with friends, but a Sunday isn’t a Sunday without a pancake in our house.”

Cooking On A Bootstrap by Jack Monroe, published by Bluebird, priced £15.99.

You’ll need

2 tsp butter

150g plain flour 1tsp bicarbonate of soda

1tbsp granulated sugar 80ml milk

2 medium or large eggs 100g frozen berries Oil, for greasing Golden syrup or honey, to serve

Method

1. Pop butter in a microwave-proof dish and melt for a few seconds. Set to one side.

2. Pour the flour, bicarb and sugar into a bowl and mix well to combine. Make a well in the middle of the dry ingredients and pour in milk and melted butter. Crack in the eggs and mix together to make a pancake mix. 3. Let it rest for half an hour. This is important, and helps create the lightest, fluffiest pancakes. The best place to rest it is in the fridge, as cold batter meeting hot oil is the optimum for an airy, perfect reaction.

4. When the batter is rested, remove from the fridge, tip in the berries, and give it a quick stir.

5. Grab a frying pan, preferably a non-stick one, and brush it with a little oil. Bring it to a high heat for a minute to warm the pan through, but don’t let the oil start smoking, so watch it. Reduce the heat to medium, and dollop in some pancake mixture.

6. The first one is always the worst – a snack for the hard-working chef is my rule! Cook for one minute and then, using a spatula, gently turn it over. Repeat until all of the pancake batter is used up, and serve in a stack, hot, with something runny and sweet.