I had SO much fun at today’s Whole Foods Demo. This was my 3rd Demo at Whole Foods, and, in my humble opinion, the best yet. We had an interactive group of guests in the Cafe at the Quarry Whole Foods Market. One of my chefs, Rebecca, showed up to watch the demo and I ended up having her come forward to cook pancakes so I could focus on chatting with the guests. (Thank you, Rebecca!)
Today was a prime example of what could go wrong in the kitchen (or at a demo in front of a group of guests….). I shook the plastic bottle of cream and the top went flying and cream shot out. THANK GOODNESS it landed on an empty chair. I unplugged the griddle, thinking it was the plug for the food processor. Rebecca figured out she’d lost heat and plugged it back in. We filled in the re-heating time by sharing funny cooking stories and answering questions from the audience. AND we ended up with a batch of really thin pancakes that I was able to fill and roll up, for a different final product.
All in all, the pancake stacks turned out DELISH and we all had fun. A couple of the ladies at the demo even ended up exchanging phone numbers so they could keep in touch. I drove home with a smile on my face, and a happy heart.
Here’s today’s recipe, modified from Gemma Stafford’s recipe.
Carrot Cake Pancakes with Mascarpone-Cream Cheese Frosting, Maple Syrup, Powdered Sugar and Walnuts – serves 4, generously
Ingredients
- 1 ¼ cup all purpose flour
- 2 teaspoon baking powder
- ¼ teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- ¼ Cup brown sugar
- 1 ¼ cup milk
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 2 cup carrots, peeled chopped
- 2 tablespoons raisins (optional)
- 1 egg
- 2 tablespoons vegetable oil
- Cream Cheese Frosting
- 2 oz cream cheese, room temperature
- 2 oz mascarpone
- ¼ cup heavy cream
- 2 tbsp sugar
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- For griddle
- butter
- nonstick spray
- Garnish:
- long toothpicks or skewers
- Maple syrup
- about 1/2 cup chopped walnuts
Cooking Instructions
Place peeled, coarsely chopped carrots in a food processor. Process the carrots until they are shredded. Add the vanilla, egg, milk, raisins (optional) and pulse until well blended.
In a large bowl, mix together the dry ingredients: flour, baking powder, cinnamon, salt and brown sugar.
Add the carrot mixture and oil to the dry ingredients and stir to combine. Don’t over-mix or your pancakes will end up flat and tough. You can chill this mixture in the refrigerator for use later in the day or the next day.
Heat a griddle to 350º. When griddle is hot, add a little butter or non-stick spray. Scoop a big spoonful of batter onto the griddle. Cook on the first side until bubbles form all over the top of the pancake and the edges begin to brown a bit.
Flip the pancakes and cook 1 to 2 minutes on the second side.
For the Mascarpone-Cream Cheese Frosting: Place the mascarpone, cream cheese, vanilla and sugar in the bowl of your stand mixer or in a bowl to use with a hand mixer. Beat the ingredients until the mixture is smooth. Add in the cream and continue to beat until the mix thickens.
Pile up your pancakes, placing dollops of the frosting in between each pancake, and topping the pancake stack with a dollop of frosting. (You can insert a pretty, long toothpick in the center of the stack to hold the pancake stack together.) Drizzle the stack with maple syrup, a sprinkle of powdered sugar, if desired, and chopped walnuts
I’m at the Quarry Market Whole Foods the second Thursday of each month at 1:00 p.m. The demo is FREE. We ask that you register so we can plan accordingly. You can register by clicking right here. Whole Foods has a bunch of really neat activities for the community. Go to the Whole Foods website and click on Find A Store, then navigate to that store’s Events Page.
If there’s a topic you’d like to me to address, or an item Whole Foods carries that you’d like to see used in a recipe, reach out to me via text 210-683-2933 or e-mail Catherine@LavishCuisine.com. I’d be happy to work in your idea at my next demo. I hope to see you on Thursday, May 11th at 1:00 p.m. at the Quarry Market Whole Foods, in the Cafe.