Adventures in Abelskievers!

One of my fondest memories of my maternal grandmother from growing up was her making abelskievers on Saturday mornings during her visits, and my brothers and I eating them as fast as they came out of the pan. For those who don't know what Abelskievers are, they are "golf-ball pancakes" - a danish(?) pasty apparently served mostly on holidays. To me, though, they're mostly a wonderful memory of Mamu.



For Christmas, I got an abelskiever pan. Yes, they need a special pan - a cast-iron one with half sphere spots to cook the abelskievers. (I'll take a picture and post it later.)

I tried looking up recipes online, and then was lucky enough to have a friend who has Mamu's recipe send it to me. Yay!

So, to be able to find the recipe easier, and not have to look it up on my facebook messages next time, here it is...along with the things I've learned with the first few batches.

Ingredients:

2 cups buttermilk

2 cups flour

3 eggs, separated

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt

2 tsp sugar

Instructions:

Whisk together everything except the egg whites.

Whip egg whites until stiff and fold into batter.

Heat pan over medium heat until hot. Brush a little oil into all cups, and a little on the top of the pan as well (so the abelskievers don't stick when you overflow the batter. No matter how hard you try, it'll happen.)

Fill the cups about 2/3 full with batter. I found that using my medium sized Pampered Chef scoop gives me the right amount of batter. Don't overfill, or they won't have room and will expand out of the pan, making a mess.

Using a skewer (or knitting needle) Turn the abelskievers 1/4 turn at a time, to form the ball shape. I make sure I always put the batter into the cups in the same order, then turn them in the same order as well. This is the part that takes the most practice, and I'm still working on getting it right.

My first batch tends to stick to the pan and won't turn, leaving me with a big mess, and sometimes having to toss out the whole first set. Later sets sometimes end up raw in the middle, because I've either turned them too fast, or forgot to let them keep cooking long enough after the edges are all sealed to bake the insides. They are theoretically done when the skewer (or knitting needle, or a toothpick) can be stuck into the center and come out clean. I don't have good luck with that, because I'm just as likely to miss the raw spot when I stick the skewer in. I tend to check them by tearing open the middle one (most likely to be uncooked) and looking. If it's still raw, I put it back in the pan for another couple minutes.

When you get them cooked, sprinkle with powdered sugar and eat with butter. Or eat with applesauce...or raspberry jam...or experiment. I like to put butter and powdered sugar inside mine.

Lessons I learned in the first few batches -

1) Sour milk may be able to be substituted instead of Buttermilk, but use white vinegar, not apple cider vinegar. (Sour Milk is a couple Tbsp vinegar added to a cup or so of milk and left for a few minutes. It's a substitution I usually do for pancakes, since I don't, or at least didn't, keep buttermilk in the house.) The first batch I made I didn't have buttermilk or white vinegar in the house, so I used cider vinegar instead. They didn't turn out badly, but I could taste the vinegar.

2) Use a skewer or knitting needle, not a fork ( or Two-k) to turn them. I tried using a two-pronged fork (Two-k) for the first time I made them, and they didn't turn well. It got goopy, and I couldn't grab the abelskievers right when I tried to turn them.

3) Make sure to get oil all the way up to the top of the cup for the first batch. I seem to have my first batch stick really badly, and I think part of it is not having the oil all the way up. Either that, or maybe I need to bake the oil on better and check the seasoning on my pan.

As a higher skill-level addition...once you've mastered (hah!) basic abelskievers, you can do filled ones, too, by putting a little batter in the cup, then applesauce or raspberry jam, then more batter. I'm not nearly ready to try those...but I'm looking forward to the day that I can. In the meantime...the kids and I are all enjoying my practicing.

(Edit - added on  Feb. 10)

In general, my batch today turned out much better. First, I put extra oil into the pans to begin with, after a friend's suggestion. For the first batch, I filled the cup about 1/4 of the way with oil. The first batch didn't stick. It did, however, burn a bit, because I had the heat too high.

I learned to SLOW DOWN while I was turning the abelskievers. With the heat on medium low to low, I let each section cook a bit more before turning. They worked much better, and while the batter flowed very slowly, it cooked more evenly.