Red Velvet Pancakes with Cream Cheese Glaze for Valentine’s Day Brunch

UPDATE: This post is from last year, but I’m reposting it because Valentines Day is tomorrow! From the looks of what I posted last year, February is just a crazy busy month- this year proves to be no exception. With one kid off at college, and another with a drivers license, I won’t be making a bit brunch, but I do plan to make a gluten free version of the pancakes for my Valentine friend Rob. 🙂

I have been working 16 hour days pretty consistently for a couple of weeks; my kids (and blog) have been pretty neglected in the food department. Valentine’s Day is later this week, and I won’t be able to celebrate it with them, so I decided to celebrate it with them in the few hours I had free this past Sunday. We had a great brunch – five teenagers and me! We enjoyed red velvet pancakes with a cream cheese glaze, a huge plate of bacon and sausage, scrambled eggs, and some beautiful bright red berries. The pancakes were a total cheat because I started with my favorite pancake mix (Krusteaz Buttermilk) and just added cocoa, powdered sugar, and some red food coloring gel. The glaze was also really easy – it was essentially my cream cheese frosting made a little thinner and with a little less sugar. If you would like to make heart shaped (or any other shape) pancakes, use a cookie cutter as your form. Note: the shaped pancakes are more time consuming, so I did a combination of plain round pancakes and made a few special shaped and decorated pancakes for each person.

INGREDIENTS:

• Favorite Pancake Batter (mix or made from scratch)
• 1-3 TBS. Cocoa Powder (use about1 TBS. for every batch of 6-8 pancakes)
• 1-4 TBS. Confectioner’s (powdered) Sugar (can substitute granulated sugar, but be sure to mix really well)
• Red Food Coloring Gel (I have never tried with regular liquid food coloring, but it would probably work fine)

INSTRUCTIONS:

Prepare pancake batter in desired amount as directed on mix (or according to recipe). Add cocoa and sugar and mix well until incorporated. Add food coloring until desired color is reached – you can experiment from everything from a light pink to a deep red. Heat a non-stick pan or griddle. Ladle batter into pan. If you want to make shaped pancakes: generously grease a cookie cutter and lay in the pan; ladle batter into cookie cutter and spread to fill out the form – but don’t make too thick. When top of batter begins to show signs of bubbles, flip and continue cooking until cooked through (another 30-60 seconds depending in thickness of pancake). If using a cookie cutter to shape pancake: flip the cookie cutter over and gently push (from the cooked side) the pancake through and out of the cutter into the pan – then cook on remaining side. Serve with syrup of cream cheese glaze (see recipe below). If using glaze, you can decorate as desired.

For the CREAM CHEESE GLAZE:

• 4 Oz. Cream Cheese – softened
• 1/4 Cup Butter- Softened
• 1.5-2 Cups Confectioner’s (Powdered) Sugar
• Optional: 1-3 TBS. Milk

Combine all ingredients using enough sugar to reach desired consistency. If you want a thinner glaze, add milk to the mix. Drizzle over pancakes or add to a squirt dispensary bottle to write a message or decorate.

 

1.5-2 cups powdered sugar