Finnish Pancake

 I am posting this a day before my regular schedule, as Finnish Midsummer festivities are starting tomorrow. Finns celebrate the nightless night of Midsummer with vigor; favorite activities are barbequing, bonfires, drink, music and dance. I am past the wild party phase, so I just have my mother over and I am gonna feed her my latest cooking notions. Let's see if you get a picture later! Happy Midsummer everyone!

And now to the pancake.

Almost done

 One of the goodies my gran used to make when I was younger, was pancake. Not what is internationally known as pancake but Finnish Pancake. I call this Finnish Pancake, as I haven't seen the name pancake used this way anywhere else nor heard of similar recipe from other countries (though I am quite sure there's something similar somewhere). Pancake in Finland is usually a form of crêpes, and called lätty, räiskäle or ohukainen. But then there's this other kind of pancake, (literally) pannukakku, in Finland. There's an interesting read in Wikipedia about different kinds of pancakes, if you want to read about regional varieties and history.

Finnish pancake is not what is usually known as pancake. More like baking tray cake. The dough used is almost the same as in your regular pancakes but you bake it in the oven in one big mass. My baking tray is 35cmx37cm (or so). Use a deep baking tray with high borders and line it with a baking parchment. You can, of course, use skimmed milk, oil instead of butter and use just 2 large eggs, if you want skinnier result. I won't guarantee the taste, then, but it's possible. Number of eggs depends on the size of eggs, and how rich and bumpy you want it. This pancake here has 3 large eggs whipped in. I've seen some recipes with more added sugar but since you have it with a sweet jam, ice cream and/or whipped cream, you could leave sugar completely out of the dough. Just maybe sprinkle sugar lightly over the pancake when it's out of the oven.

There are also salty versions of this, with for instance ham and cheese. For those, ditch the sugar, mix filling into dough and bake (and dont serve with cream and jam ;). My gran used to make a blood pancake in the oven, and it was very good with lingonberry jam. I think I need to fish the recipe out of her for future reference.

This is what you should get!

Nevertheless, here's the basic recipe for sweet pannukakku:

• 1 L milk (semi-skimmed/whole)
• 5 dl wheat flour
• 3-5 eggs
• 3 tbsp sugar
• 1 tsp salt
• 0,5-1 dl butter

To serve:
Jam, whipped cream or ice cream, sugar. Traditionally jams with strawberry, on it's own or combined with other berries or fruit are called "Pancake Jam" but any sweet jam will do.

1. Set your oven to 200C and line a baking tray with parchment.








2. Pour milk in a bowl and whisk flour, salt and sugar in. Let it sit until the oven is ready.








3. Melt butter. You can also cut butter in pieces and place them evenly over the baking tray before pouring in the dough.







4. Add eggs and butter.









5. Pour it in a baking tray covered with baking parchment.











6. Bake for 30-45 mins, until its golden brown and developed considerable bumps. Bumps, or Nattaset as my gran says. Nattaset are fells, very small mountains right at the bosom Maiden of Finland. And Maiden of Finland refers to the shape of the country on the world map.

Serve with cream and jam