Blend Pancake Batter In An Instant With A Kitchen Tool Hack

If speed-prepping is a part of your breakfast routine, you may be looking for a faster way to mix pancake batter. Rizwan Asad, a recipe developer who blogs at Chocolates and Chai, suggests employing the same kitchen tool you use to fix lumpy gravy and thicken up a soup with pureed vegetables. As he told The Takeout, "An immersion blender can give you a silky-smooth pancake batter in seconds."

That being said, Asad did add a caveat. "The risk is that it's too good at mixing." After more than a few seconds, you might find you've over-mixed the batter. "Overmixing pancake batter activates more gluten in the flour, which leads to tough, rubbery pancakes," he said. He feels an immersion blender might be better suited for making crêpes than thick, diner-style pancakes. If you've got your heart set on the latter, "You can absolutely use an immersion blender for pancake batter," he said. "You just need to be careful with it ... In pancakes, gentleness wins. With an immersion blender, think 'light, lazy mixing,' not 'power tool.'"

Before you begin blending, combine all of the ingredients in a tall, narrow container as opposed to a wide bowl. "It reduces splatter and ensures more even blending," Asad explained. Pour in the wet ingredients, then add the dry ones on top for smoother blending and less mess. Once you start the immersion blender, run it in short bursts and stop as soon as the flour is mostly mixed in. "Streaks of flour should still be visible when you stop," Asad said. "With pancake batter, 'lazy' mixing is actually a virtue."

After the batter is mixed, let it sit for 5 to 10 minutes. This resting period, Asad says, serves several purposes. "This helps hydrate the flour and relax any gluten you may have accidentally woken up, and also allows air bubbles to form naturally, giving you a better rise."

One more tip from Asad involves any mix-ins you may wish to add — fold these in by hand after you've mixed the batter. As he warned, "The blender will pulverize your mix-ins into oblivion, turning chocolate chips into streaky cocoa swirls and berries into jammy mush." In fact, you might not want to add those mix-ins to the batter at all, but rather sprinkle them over the top once the pancakes are in the pan.