Photo a Day in September #22

22.  Autumn

I made pumpkin pancakes and homemade (buttermilk) syrup to celebrate the first day of fall!  I had planned to make pumpkin waffles, but I couldn't find the recipe I used last fall.  (We bought a case of pumpkin pie mix last year, and we have been trying to use it up ever since then.  The problem is that most recipes call for canned pureed pumpkin--not pumpkin pie mix.  This lost recipe actually used what we have.)  I googled recipes and came up with two; I went with the one that required less ingredients.

I've said it before, and I'll say it again:  You win some, you lose some.  These pumpkin waffles were a major fail.  Despite using plenty of oil to oil the waffle iron, they were sticking like CRAZY.  I threw out the first one and tried again.  I thought maybe I just needed to leave it in there longer, so I left it in there three times as long, AND IT STILL STUCK!  I added in some more baking mix and an egg (yeah, the original recipe didn't call for an egg) to the batter.  It still stuck!  So I tried pancakes...and they were not flippable!  So I added YET ANOTHER EGG and tried again.  This time the pancakes came out just fine.  It may have been because I had to use regular sugar over what was called (brown sugar) since we were out.  But after researching, it seems like that shouldn't have made too big of a difference in the waffle/pancake recipe.  I think the problem lay in the fact that it used water over milk and no eggs.  Needless to say, I will not be using that recipe again.

I almost gave up, but I had already put my buttermilk syrup on.  It was causing problems on its own since I didn't have any buttermilk and was worried my substitute (vinegar + milk) wasn't going to work.  Thankfully, it did!  I LOVE this stuff.  It is like CRACK.  How did you ring in the new season??