Recipe Mon Oct 29 2007

No, It's Not a Manhole Cover.

By Yu Kizawa

It's finally autumn; the chill in the air seems to be sticking around, the trees are raining down gloriously hued leaves onto the sidewalks, and the local famers' tables are brimming with apples, pears, pumpkins, yams, bunches of Indian corn and twigs of bittersweets. From the cornucopia of autumn, I've always loved the combination of sweet potatoes and apples. One recent morning, I returned to my old favorite combination for breakfast.

Essentially a big, multi-serving pancake loaded with sweet potatoes and apples, then cut into individual pieces at the table, this autumn harvest pancake makes for a fun presentation. The sweet potato circles, embedded on the surface of the flipped-up pancake announce autumn, and their earthy sweetness is met by the tart-sweet goodness of the apple wedges hidden inside. And best of all, it only takes a bowl and a skillet to cook.

Autumn Harvest Pancake (for three normal stomachs, or two particularly hungry ones)

• 1 cup your favorite pancake mix
• 1 egg
• enough milk to achieve pancake-batter consistency, about 1 cup
• 1 medium cooking apple (I used the Red Yorking kind, from Nichols Farm)
• 1 small sweet potato (I used a Japanese one, but other kinds would do, too)
• a dash of cinnamon
• 1/2 tablespoon sugar
• 1 teaspoon butter

1. Core the apple and cut into 12 wedges. Wash the sweet potato and cut into thin disks, about 1/8 inches each.
2. Heat the butter in a large skillet. Arrange the sweet potato pieces on the skillet and grill over medium heat. Turn pieces over when one side is nicely browned.
3. Meanwhile, make the pancake batter in a bowl and set aside.
4. When the sweet potatoes are mostly cooked through, after about 15 minutes, arrange apple pieces on top of the sweet potatoes, and sprinkle evenly with cinnamon and sugar. Cover the skillet and cook.
5. When the apple pieces are almost done (tender and semi-transparent), pour the pancake batter over the sweet potatoes and apples. Even out the surface. Cover the skillet and cook till small bubbles appear on the surface of the batter.
6. Flip the pancake, using a spatula. (Be careful so that the sweet potato circles won't fall out.) Continue cooking until the second side browns and the pancake is cooked through.
7. Serve on a large platter, potato-side up. Cut it up at the table and enjoy with maple syrup or honey.

My partner, upon seeing the pancake occupying the full expanse of our largest platter, seemed unconvinced. "It's a manhole cover!" he said. "No, it's a pancake," I reassured him, although it did have the look and the size of a manhole cover--especially with the geometric arrangement of the nicely browned sweet potato disks on the top. "But it's more than an inch thick," he protested further. (It was an inch and 3/4 thick in the middle; I measured it.) By the time we had our second bites, though, the suspected manhole cover proved to be a fine and hearty piece of fall breakfast. I was particularly pleased with the slight crispiness of the sweet potato disks, which were touching the skillet directly while cooking. Though flipping the whole thing over was a bit of a challenge to my panic-prone heart, I'd definitely be making this manho pancake again.