Cakes in Camp

A have a friend who was long in the habit of serving those little boxes of cereal for breakfast when camping. Fruit Loops, Apple Jacks. That sort of thing. And to be sure, her family could evacuate camp and get home in short order. We’ve always gone for the full spread for breakfast. After this friend camped with us and had a taste of blueberry pancakes and sausages eaten al fresco, she became a convert. From that pancake forward, she would insist on a complete syrup-smothered start to the camp day.

I recently made these pancakes and forgot to put the butter in. My sister said she thought maybe they were better without. So I did a side-by-side taste test–with and without the butter. My husband and I found the pancakes sans butter to be, surprisingly, moister and fluffier. The ones with butter were denser. The kids, however, preferred the buttery version. So, you can go either way. Here’s the recipe.

• 1½ cups flour

• ½ teaspoon salt

• 2½ tablespoons sugar

• 1¾ teaspoons baking powder

• 2 eggs

• 3 tablespoons melted butter

• 1¼ cup almond milk or cow’s milk

• ¾ cup blueberries

• Breakfast sausages

Directions

1. At home, sift the flour twice. Mix the dry ingredients together in a large freezer bag and use a permanent marker to write the rest of the recipe on the bag.

2. At home, crack the eggs into a widemouthed Nalgene bottle and mix with the milk.*

3. In camp, whisk the wet ingredients. Add to the dry ingredients and mix lightly.

4. Melt the butter and let it cool. Fold the melted butter and then the blueberries into the pancake batter. If the batter seems too thick, add more milk.

5. Add a little butter to the pan. When the foam subsides, pour a half cup of batter for each pancake. When bubbles begin to form and bottoms are browned, flip the cakes. (About 2½ to 3 minutes.)

6. If your pan is large, you may need to rotate it around the smallish flame of the camp stove to evenly brown the pancakes.

7. In a separate pan, fry up the sausages. If there isn’t enough room on your stove, you can always do the sausages first and keep them warm in a bit of foil while you make the pancakes.

*Once the eggs are cracked, be sure to cook them within two days’ time.