Well, it’s been a busy few months, involving a lot of writing at work, meaning when I have free time, I’m not too excited to use it to do more writing. I’m going to try to get back to blogging, but you probably know me well enough by now to not trust any promises! Anyway, here’s another recipe from Thanksgiving (eek!), but it’s really good any time, either with leftover sweet potatoes, as here, or with pumpkin. Sorry, no picture from this one!

I purposely made more food than I thought we needed to feed the six of us last Thanksgiving, since I enjoy the leftovers and finding ways to use them. Matt and I had a couple nights of just reheating the leftovers pretty much as they were originally served, but the real fun part is figuring out ways to make the leftovers into something new. I especially had a lot of leftover sweet potatoes, and decided to try adding them to pancakes. I adapted the buttermilk pancakes I usually make from The Joy of Cooking, adding my sweet potato casserole (which was topped with coconut and hazelnuts) and some spices. Since these are a good bit sweeter than normal pancakes, they were especially great topped with tart leftover cranberry sauce!

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I found blueberries for $3/pound last week, so I actually felt like I could buy enough to do something more than sprinkle a few in my oatmeal.  Cherries were cheap too, so I modified my grandmother Meme’s blueberry muffin recipe to include some cherries too. I was hoping they’d look kind of belatedly patriotic, but actually the cherries turn darker and the blueberries turn purple when cooked, so you really can’t see the difference.

Isn’t it wonderful what happens to blueberries when they bake?  I love the way they sort of explode and seem even juicier than when you pop them in your mouth raw.  I didn’t have any lemons so I added some lemon extract, otherwise I would’ve just used lemon zest.  I like the almond flavor with the cherries and blueberries, but you could also just use vanilla.
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I have a wonderful friend named Linda who happens to have a Meyer lemon tree in her yard, and who very generously shares them with me.  When she brought a bag to choir a few weeks ago, I was thinking of making scones out of them.  Then I decided to combine with something else I love: rhubarb.  Meyer lemons are a cross between a lemon and a mandarin orange, so they’re sweeter than a normal lemon.  They also have a thinner and less bitter peel, which has a nice floral aroma that went really well with the rhubarb.  I based these scones on a recipe from Baking Bites, but added a filling of the rhubarb, which I just stewed with a bit of sugar until it was falling apart.

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I had hazelnuts leftover from the hazelnut brown butter cake, and I’ve learned the hard way that hazelnuts can go rancid rather quickly if left on the shelf too long, so I wanted to go ahead and use up the ones I had.  I was in the mood for French toast, and we also had some stale leftover bread, so I thought adding a crust of hazelnuts would kill two birds for one dish.  We’ve been buying oranges by the bag, so I added some orange juice and zest to the soaking liquid, and threw in a little Cointreau for good measure (though if you don’t have any, you could easily leave that out).  The next weekend, I made it again with pecans instead of hazelnuts — great either way.  And a tip from my mom — if you have extra orange juice, stir some into the maple syrup to top the toast. Though it’s a little more work, I’m sure these would also be great topped with the syrup from our favorite orange nutty pancakes.

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These pancakes have become somewhat of a tradition in my family. My mom first clipped the recipe out of the News and Observer several years ago, although I’m not sure what their original source was. We usually have a couple of boxes of oranges in the winter time, so this recipe is perfect for using some of them up! This year, I think my brother and I both requested them, so we had them twice — for breakfast on Christmas morning, and while staying in my grandparents’ house in Blowing Rock, NC for New Year’s. (And I’m just sharing them now … when citrus season is starting to wrap up … I know, it’s criminal!)

They come together pretty fast, but they do require a lot of juice, so it helps to have a good juicer so your arm doesn’t get too tired. As you can see, we usually serve them up with some freshly fried bacon, but they’re good on their own too. Just don’t try to substitute regular maple syrup — making the orange syrup is key!

Isn’t my grandmother Pat’s buttercup china beautiful?

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