Dear ASL students,

In order for you to fulfill the ASL mission of gaining “an outstanding American education with a global perspective,” you must be able to make my vanilla sour cream pancakes. I have adjusted my recipe from Ina Garten’s Banana pancakes, but unless you are Jack Johnson, bananas are overrated in pancakes.

Here is everything you need:

(serves 2 people)

(takes approx 15 mins)

Wet ingredients

2 tablespoons of melted butter

½ cup of sour cream

2 eggs

milk

Vanilla extract

Dry Ingredients

1 ½ cups of flour

3 tablespoons of sugar

2 teaspoons of baking powder

1 teaspoon of salt

Toppings

Butter

Maple Syrup

Blueberries (optional)

What you need to do:

In a medium size prep bowl, add the butter, sour cream and eggs, then whisk lightly. Add vanilla extract to taste. I personally like my pancakes to have a strong vanilla taste, so I add about a teaspoon of vanilla. Then in a large Prep bowl, add all of t dry ingredients and whisk roughly. Combine the wet ingredients with the dry ingredients in the large prep bowl slowly. Add a bit at a time and whisk continuously. Then add a little milk to the batter and keep whisking until it has a smooth velvety consistency.

At this point, the pancakes can be cooked or the batter can be placed in a tupperware in the fridge. Keeping the batter in the fridge for around three hours will magically improve it. Sorry I don’t know why it becomes so divine and delectable over time, I never listened in Chemistry. Personally, I like to make some pancakes immediately and save the rest of the batter for that night. A late night pancake is the best kind of pancake.

To cook the pancakes, place a large pan on medium heat. Melt some butter on the pan to prevent sticking and pour in the batter – for blueberry pancakes, add blueberries at this point. Once bubbles appear all over the face of the pancake, flip it. There is no secret to flipping a pancake, but the flips will get better with practice. Then cook the other side until it is golden.  Add some butter and syrup to the pancakes and get eating. This dish is paired nicely with a glass of milk.

Andrew Noorani is an aspiring chef who will be taking a gap year to begin his culinary career. Noorani has spent time working in the Terrace restaurant at the Amba Hotel and maintains a culinary Instagram account (@chef.Drew98). He credits his Cordon Bleu trained mother as his inspiration in the kitchen.