With a thin batter you can make thin pancakes. Photo | IST.
STEPHANIE ZONIS focuses on good foods and the people who produce them.
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November 2009
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Whole Grain & Multigrain Pancake Reviews
Page 6i: Homestead Mills Northern Lites Pancake Mixes
You are reading part of a review of 99 different whole grain and multigrain pancake mixes from 44 different manufacturers. You can return to the index of pancake mix brands, go to Page 1 of the complete pancake article or continue to the next page of reviews.
Pancake Mix Reviews:
Homestead Mills Northern Lites Pancake Mixes
All mixes come in an unsealed plastic bag within a printed cloth bag. All mixes call for the same ingredients in the same quantities. After preparing the Wheat & Malt variety first, I used less milk for the other mixes than was called for in the directions (a range of 1-1/2 to 2 cups). HomesteadMills.com
- Apple Pie Pancake Mix. Grain mix: whole wheat flour, unbleached wheat flour, bleached/enriched flour. I used the optional sugar, one egg (as opposed to two) and oil (as opposed to butter). The mix and batter have a faint spice aroma. I used just one cup of milk, resulting in a batter that was slightly too thick; adding about two tablespoons more milk resulted in an optimal batter consistency, but this was still much less than the 1-1/2 to 2 cup range given in the package directions. There’s a spectacular rise and good browning. The finished pancakes have a slight spice presence and are good with maple syrup. But they rise so high that the centers of three of my four test pancakes weren’t cooked through when the pancakes appeared to be done.
- Buckwheat Blend Pancake Mix. Grain mix: buckwheat flour, unbleached wheat flour, bleached/enriched wheat flour. I used the optional sugar, 2 eggs (as opposed to 1) and oil (as opposed to melted butter). I used only 1 cup of milk, but batter was still too thin; I had to add a little more mix. The batter is brownish with attractive specks of buckwheat. There’s excellent rise and beautiful browning. The finished pancakes are not at all gummy and are very mild in flavor, with just a hint of buckwheat. I didn’t expect to like these as much as I did, as I usually prefer a stronger buckwheat taste. Very good with syrup.
- Corn Meal Pancake Mix. Grain mix: corn meal flour, unbleached flour, bleached/enriched flour. I used the optional sugar, one egg (as opposed to two) and melted butter (as opposed to oil). The range of liquid given was 1-1/2 to 2 cups of milk. Having made the Wheat & Malt variety first, I used just one cup of milk, but the batter was so thin I had to add more mix. There’s good rise and good browning. The finished pancakes had a very slight corn flavor and were rather gummy.
- Ginger Snap Pancake Mix. Grain mix: whole wheat flour, unbleached wheat flour, bleached/enriched wheat flour. The mix has a strong spice aroma, while batter had a moderate spice scent. I used the optional sugar, melted butter (as opposed to oil) and one egg (as opposed to two). I used one cup milk, resulting in a batter of a good consistency, but there were too many lumps in it. There’s excellent rise and good browning. The finished pancakes have some spice presence, but aren’t notable.
- Hot Buttered Cinnamon Roll Pancake Mix. Grain mix: whole wheat flour, unbleached wheat flour, bleached/enriched wheat flour. The mix and batter have a definite spice scent. I used the optional sugar, two eggs (as opposed to one) and melted butter (as opposed to oil). Used only one cup of milk, but batter was still too thin—I had to add more mix. Even when whisked, the batter had too many lumps, some of which were detectable in the finished pancakes. There’s excellent rise and good browning. The finished pancakes have a slight spice taste and dry texture; maple syrup enhances the spice flavor. Just okay.
- Pumpkin Pie Pancake Mix. Grain mix: whole wheat flour, unbleached wheat flour, bleached/enriched wheat flour. The mix has a strong spice aroma that is almost absent in the batter. I used optional sugar, oil (as opposed to butter) and one egg (as opposed to two). With one cup of milk, the batter was slightly too thin; I had to add a little more mix. There’s excellent rise and fine browning. The finished pancakes are fluffy, but with an odd and not especially pleasant spice taste.
- Wheat & Malt Pancake Mix. Grain mix: whole wheat flour, unbleached wheat flour, bleached/enriched wheat flour. I used optional sugar and lemon juice, one egg (as opposed to two) and oil (as opposed to butter). The ingredients and their quantities to add to mix are listed (including a range of milk), but there are no real instructions except “Do not overbeat.” When prepared according to package directions using the lowest amount of milk in the range, the batter was much too thin; I had to add significantly more mix. There was less rise than most, with fine browning. The finished pancakes are light in color, with some attractive grain specks. The texture was somewhat gummy. Lemon juice adds a lovely, barely perceptible tangy note. They’re very good with maple syrup.
- Whole Wheat Pancake Mix. Grain mix: whole wheat flour, unbleached flour, bleached/enriched flour. I used two eggs (as opposed to one), optional sugar and oil (as opposed to butter). Having made up the Wheat & Malt Mix first and seeing that this mix called for the same ingredients in the same quantities, I used only one cup of milk (not the 1-1/2 to 2 cups listed), and the batter was of a great consistency with very good rise and great browning. These are not much different from the Wheat & Malt variety: light color, texture and flavor. Good with syrup.
- Wild Rice Recipe Pancake Mix. Grain mix: wild rice flour, unbleached wheat flour, bleached/enriched wheat flour. I used the optional sugar, melted butter (as opposed to oil) and two eggs (as opposed to one). With one cup of milk, the batter was slightly too thin; I had to add a little more mix. The batter was the grayish brown color typical of wild rice pancake batter. An excellent rise and great browning. The finished pancakes are fluffy, not gummy, with a pleasant earthiness from the wild rice flour. Very good with syrup, though the maple flavor can overwhelm the wild rice taste.
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