I am a morning person. I think it’s some kind of genetic flaw, just like my magical ability to lose the whole world inside my purse and also misplace my sunglasses on top of my head. My eyes are open at least 15 minutes before the back-up-to-my-biological-clock alarm goes off on my phone.
My mom is a serious morning person. She always has been and still is, as evidenced by the text messages that she sometimes sends me at 5:30 a.m.
I am always the first one up around here. Norma Jean (Danger Kitty) is never far behind me. She talks to me while I put on the coffee, turn on the news, start a load of laundry, and set to packing lunches.
Once I call for the boys to wake up it’s total rushing chaos all full of flying cereal bowls and missing socks. But before that it’s just the ambient noise of the weather on TV and the a.m. antics of my fuzzy little companion.
Chad is always the last person to wake up. He will leap out of bed at the last possible second and get ready for work in 6 minutes flat.
Except for yesterday.
Because YESTERDAY, while I smeared peanut butter and jelly on thick slices of whole wheat bread, I dropped a glob of jelly on the floor next to my toe. In true Heather fashion I was in my bare feet. I took a step back and looked towards the floor to scope out the offending escaped jelly and that’s when I saw it:
The HUGEST Black Widow Spider ever. EVER. I mean it.
And so I screamed. It wasn’t really intentional. The shrill sound just involuntarily escaped my lips.
Norma leaped onto a kitchen chair, preparing for attack. I ran into the bedroom yelling, “Emergency! Spider Emergency! I’m serious this time!,” because this is undoubtedly NOT the first time I’ve woken Chad up screaming because of a creature.
He begrudgingly swung his feet to the floor and then it dawned on me in the middle of my panic: Norma is going to jump on a highly poisonous and gigantic spider and it’s going to bite her!!!
So I ran back into the kitchen just in time to see that Norma Jean had repositioned herself right in front of the black widow and as she lunged in to do what cats do best (play with things until they die) ugly mean spider lunged back!
I snatched up little Danger Kitty just in time and we ran back towards the bedroom to find relative safety.
Chad finally shuffled into the kitchen to handle the scary business while us girls peered around the corner waiting for things to be declared safe. By this time the boys were perched on the back of the sofa wondering why in the world I was screaming like a lunatic in the pre-dawn of a school morning.
Chad confirmed that yes, that WAS a black widow, yes it IS dead, and yes it WAS the most gimantico black widow any of us has ever seen and surely would have derailed our day with an emergency room visit.
To be clear, I do not usually advocate killing anything. I’m a catch and release kind of girl. But when it comes to poisonous spiders within an inch of my toe that also try to attack my kitty, I have a zero tolerance policy.
So that’s the story of how I was almost killed in my own kitchen before the sun even came up yesterday morning.
I am still a morning person, which is why I inundate you with breakfast recipes.
But from now on I’m wearing slippers.
- 1½ cups whole wheat flour
- 2 tablespoons brown sugar
- 1½ teaspoons baking powder
- ¼ teaspoon baking soda
- 1 teaspoon ginger
- ½ teaspoon cinnamon
- ½ teaspoon kosher salt
- ⅛ teaspoon ground cloves
- 1 egg
- 3 tablespoons molasses
- 1½ cups buttermilk
- butter for the griddle or skillet
- syrup, butter, and whipped cream for serving
- In a large bowl whisk together the whole wheat flour, brown sugar, baking powder, baking soda, ginger, cinnamon, kosher salt, and cloves.
- In another smaller bowl slightly beat the egg, add the molasses, and then the buttermilk.
- Add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients, mix well, and then set aside for about 10 minutes.
- Heat a large skillet or pancake griddle. Butter generously. Pour the batter onto the hot cooking surface about ¼ cup at a time. When the surface of the pancake is bubbly, flip it. Leave on the second side for another minute.
- Serve hot!!
(crafted and adapted from MY RECIPE)
This looks so good! One of the things I don’t like about premade gingerbread mixes is that they are too sweet and not spicy enough. LOVE molasses! I need to try this! Although not the day after elections. Cause all I’m making is coffee 🙂
My kids were trying to stay up to watch. I shooed them outta my space. I’m doubling up on the coffee tomorrow morning. The cloves lend these a nice spicy hand! Only 2 tablespoons of brown sugar and nice rich molasses. Sooo good and so easy!!
Ok…went on your Facebook now here I am on this page….why does your name link to the other page?? What in the h*ll Heather lol You’re playing mind games on me!!! hahaha
OMG YOU ARE SOO FUNNY!!! I literally just laughed out loud reading this post LMAO!!!!! I’m the exact same way with spiders and I love how you scooped up danger kitty hahahahahahahahahahahahaha I can SO picture Chad being like ‘yes it’s dead…yes you’re right it was huge’ LOL Classic!!! Meanwhile, these pancakes look amazing…I’m going to investigate this new website and see what the heck else I missed!!!
I THINK what happened is that I may have accessed your post through my wordpress.com reader which would link you to the last thing published on my wordpress.com blog. That was Strawberry Muffins. I got a lot of traffic landing there the last few days so I must have done that more than once lol. Or there’s some kind of error. What. Ever.
Norma Jean and I were in fear for our lives. Okay, well probly not Norma Jean. She was ready to get that spider for me!! Chad is completely nonplussed with my creature panic. BUT that’s his job. Handle it. Even at 5 in the morning.
haha this is why I need a man!!! When there’s a spider here I run screaming…then go find a shoe and stomp it or slap it off the wall, freak out for another few minutes, then slide it onto a magazine so I don’t have to touch it run to the bathroom and down the toilet it goes haha I HATE it, honestly can’t stand it!! When I get water bugs…they greet me everyday those sons a b*tches haha You gotta good man!!!
I love MORNINGS! You are in good company. I cannot wait to try these gingerbread pancakes. I make gingerbread cinnamon rolls b/c I cannot get enough gingerbread flavored treats – thanks for the recipe!
Heyyyy mornings are great!! If I miss the morning I feel like I’ve lost the whole entire day. Let me know how these go for you. I LOVE them. And if you feel inclined to share gingerbread cinnamon rolls with me I’d feel inclined to love those, too.
Easily, I take a regular cinnamon roll recipe, and substitute molasses for sugar – then use Hodgeson Mills Yeast for dense flours (else the molassess seems to make the dough to ‘heavy’ for regular yeast to work and you get very flat cinnamon rolls), I add some cinnamon to the sweet dough along with ginger (powdered) and a touch of cloves – sometimes orange rind. I use a standard brown sugar, cinnamon & butter mix for the gooey insides, same proofing time once they’re cut – and instead of a 10x & milk icing, I will use 10x sugar and bit o’orange juice. I love gingerbread and orange – but if I’m not into the orange – than a standard 10x sugar & milk icing. I have no difinitiave amounts of cinnamon, ginger, cloves and rind – just sort of eye it.
I always like sharing recipes – I don’t believe in ‘secrets’ when it comes to baking. That’s the best part is sharing the things that them special.
Ohhh we are so agreed on the sharing. Thank you so much!!! Orange zest is so amazing. I made compound orange butter and stuffed it under the skin of a whole roasting chicken… it was completely great.
DROOOOOOOL
I love roasted chicken – I’ll have to try that next time I pull out my rotissaire (sp) oven!
I figured anyone blogging with recipes is probably of the same mind. I wrote a post about my love of baking (http://themercenaryresearcher.wordpress.com/2012/07/10/food-music-secrets/)
We have a lot of spiders where we live. I hate them. My husband rarely responds to my screams of ‘spider emergency’ anymore. But, I can see why the spider was drawn to you. Those pancakes are quite alluring. 🙂
Hey!! Thanks!! Chad is supremely annoyed when I scream because I think for a second he panics and then he realizes that I may be overreacting. Not that I actually wanted a killer spider in my kitchen, but I was kinda like “Ha! In yer face!!”
It is validating to have someone else acknowledge the size of the spider threat. I get it.
totally NOT a morning person – I wake up about an hour before my alarm, check I still have time to sleep then make the most of it before being buzzed awake at 6, only to hit snooze for another 40 minutes or so (I’m not even kidding)! And I am DEFINITELY NOT a spider person – this would have about killed me even if it ddin’t actually kill me I think – so brave! I am dreading a spider turning up here uninvited now that i’m on my own, I don’t know what i’ll do! I’m glad you and Norma Jean are ok – well done Chad! These pancakes look every bit as delicious as i thought they would, and I don’t need an oven, AND I have a three day weekend, so on Saturday I might try and search out the ingredients and *fingers crossed* if I find them, I can make myself a suitably sunday-ish breakfast in bed with coffee and book at whatvere time my alarm doesn’t wake me! This is such a great plan! Cross everything I find the ingredients!
I’ll tell you what my sister did in her college dorm room: whenever a spider invaded her space she just trapped it under a glass and left it there in its own little spider terrarium until someone braver than she arrived to take it away. When I went up to help her move out we had the room entirely cleared save the spider under the glass in the bathroom.
Your weekend plan sounds AMAZING. I hope hope hope you find the ingredients!!! Molasses and the spices are really important. The other stuff you could probably just interchange for what you’re able to find. Fingers crossed!!
Oh my gracious.. Delish pancakes and those potatoes look so good. Those are definitely going in my recipe book to try very soon.
If I had of seen that spider no breakfast would have gotten served that day. I would have been a wreck 🙂
So here’s the funny thing about food blogging… I eat things at all the wrong times of day so’s I can photograph the food and sometimes it takes me a few tries to work out a new recipe. This means that I eat pancakes at 2:30 in the afternoon and sometimes I have brownies for breakfast. It’s kind of wonderful. Spiders be damned.
Oh no!! That’s too scary. I don’t do spiders and I would truly freak out if I came close to a black widow. Also…. I woke up at 2:30 am last sun. morning. I cleaned the microwave, did laundry, some schoolwork. And sometime that day I decided I have officially turned into mom.
Yeah… that officially happened to me a few years back (the fact that you did all this at 2:30 am is cracking me up right now). If only we age as gracefully…
I love mornings too, I think so much clearer then- yet I still have a hard time waking up before 7:00 am?! I love that you’ve done a gingerbread post, it is the first one I’ve seen since the fall cooking season went in full swing. I can’t wait to try these!
I’m so into gingerbread right now! You’ll love these! Also if you scroll around through the comments here there’s a recipe for gingerbread cinnamon rolls. How’s about that?!!
These were DELICIOUS!! I didn’t have WW flour – so used a mixture of oatbran and white flour (for waffles, I’ll use oats and oatbran) – SCRUMPTIOUS
So glad!!! I’ll probably make them again tomorrow!
My son said best pancakes EVER!
I am the first one up around my house every morning. Even the days I don’t need to get up early I do 🙂
Great recipe, I love gingerbread! I’m going to have to try it!
Thanks,
Sami
I get up early when I don’t have to — weird internal alarm clock! Hope you’ll try these pancakes — one of my favorite recipes ever!!
I am the opposite of morning person…I am a complete night owl! So these super yummy pancakes will be perfect for dinner…that’s when I eat breakfast 😉 I am so backwards sometimes!!
You are hilarious Heather! I would still be screaming if I saw a black widow in my kitchen. In fact, I would probably have to call in an exterminator so I would be able to walk in there again…Yuck!! I am so glad that you were able to grab danger kitty before she started playing with her new deadly toy. 🙂
I can’t believe you had a black widow in your kitchen!! Scary stuff.
Sorry I’m just making it over here to comment on these delicious pancakes. They caught my eye right off the bat at Saturday Night Fever last week, but it has been a busy week. I love gingerbread, so I know I would love these babies!
Don’t apologize to me Sweets! You know I love waiting till the last minute 🙂 Make pancakes!! Even if it’s not breakfast anymore.