The Beginning of the End

Thank you to those of you who took the time to read my past posts and were kind enough to comment. I appreciate your support and hope that somehow my experiences can help others through difficult times. Or at least help you whip up something tasty!

In the summer of 2010, my Mom had some random back and flank pain. She was 76 years old and aside from osteoarthritis, was in good health. She visited her doctor and was given antibiotics for a bladder infection. She felt better but couldn't shake some new shortness of breath and the persistent nagging pain in her back and side. My folks visited us over the 4th of July holiday and she and I had a really fun day out hitting the garden centers, having lunch and enjoying each other's company.  During our day out she often needed to sit and catch her breath and chalked it up to more activity than normal. With her knees and back arthritis, she often needed to slow down and give her joints a chance to quiet.  We enjoyed their visit and made plans to get together in the fall at their house. My Dad had been approved for a new treatment for his chronic prostate cancer and needed to be close to home for several weeks during the treatment.

On Sept. 11, HB and I flew out to California for a 2 week vacation. We started out in his old stomping grounds of Orange County and needed to visit Riverside to finish some details of his mother's estate. We then headed up the 101 with plans to drive the coast all the way to Seattle. Along the way we'd meet up with groups of friends and his daughter and her partner. On day 6 of our trip, we were having dinner in Monterrey, and my phone rang. It was my Dad, my Mom had gone in for a follow up appointment related to her bladder infection and her doctor ordered a chest x-ray and she was immediately ordered into admission to the hospital. She had something suspicious in her lungs and erring on the side of caution her doctor wanted her admitted for further tests. She was feeling ok, anxious and ready for answers. We offered to cut our vacation short, but both of my parents said NO, just go have fun.

We spoke to them every day. My Mom was frustrated and concerned. My Dad was exhausted and worried. Her doctors weren't telling her anything, just ordering more tests. She finally put up a huge fuss and was discharged on day 8 with orders to undergo two more tests before her doctors would give her any answers. She had asked one of her nurses to review her records and write down every test she'd had from blood work to aspirations to x-rays. We were back home and ready to go visit. She insisted she was fine and that we should get back to work and come the following weekend.

I can't remember the words but I remember the feeling. My Dad sent me an email at work saying, "We are home from the doctor, call us."  I called. I don't know if dread sneaks up on you or if it is there all along or if it comes rushing over you like a hard wind, but all at once, I wanted to throw up, shit my pants and pass out. I knew it was going to be bad news. My Mom had already beaten breast cancer 15 years earlier, had already lost 2 sisters to breast cancer, lost her mother to breast cancer and had coached my cousin through her treatment for breast cancer.  I wasn't surprised when they said she had breast cancer. I wasn't surprised when they said it was in the same location but a different cancer from her previous illness. I was completely unprepared for the rest; stage 4, advanced metastases, 5% chance of survival, it is as bad as you can image and worse.

My Mom was on one phone and couldn't talk, she had my Dad, on another line, give me the news. He was quiet. I couldn't breath. I couldn't inhale. I couldn't exhale. I wasn't holding my breath, I was just incapable of movement. Any movement, in or out, would have meant making a sound and I couldn't make a sound because I knew that sound would be something that I couldn't control. My Dad asked if I was still there I was so quiet. I finally said yes, how are you? How is Mom?  Shocked, not surprised. Resigned. Considering options. Have an appointment with an oncologist. When are you coming?

Unfortunately that weekend I came down with a horrible cold and didn't want to expose my Mom to my illness so I stayed home. By the following weekend, she'd gotten a care and treatment plan, knew more about her cancer and was ready for me to come home and help out. My Dad and I spent that beautiful Saturday out working in the yard, raking, taking down annuals, running limbs and leaves to the dump and enjoying the last warm sunny day of fall. He needed to take several breaks, but at 79 with 12 years of intermittent treatment for chronic prostate cancer, he was slowing down as well. I cooked and cleaned. My Mom and I got out and went to Kohls, her favorite store for scoring great deals. She was subdued and sarcastic, her go-to behavior when tense and nervous. She didn't want to deal with chemo. She didn't want to lose her hair. She didn't want to be sick. She didn't want to die.

Within two weeks, she started chemo. She was surprised at how well she tolerated it. She had three weeks off and then a second treatment. She had her head shaved when her hair began falling out in clumps. She bought a cheap wig but never wore it. She was tired but hopeful and feeling surprisingly well.  We made plans to go to their home for Thanksgiving. Unbeknown to us, my Dad wasn't feeling well.

When we arrived on Wednesday before Thanksgiving, both of my folks were under blankets in their recliners in their family room. Neither got up to welcome us.  My Dad said he was fighting a cold with a bad cough and my Mom was feeling wiped out and tired.

Thanksgiving was quiet. I made a small turkey and all the fixings and we enjoyed a quiet meal. I think we knew this was going to be my Mom's last Thanksgiving and I was determined to make everything traditional and familiar and comfortable. My Dad was still coughing and feeling lousy but insisting it was just a cold. He spent the night in his recliner, insisting he breathed easier sitting up rather than laying down. I believed him.

On Friday, my Mom and I got out in the afternoon for a little bit. We had no desire to tackle the Black Friday sales, but she needed to get to the pharmacy and wanted to take a slow walk through the grocery for a change of scenery. We'd called my Dad's doctor and after several messages with the service, finally spoke to someone who suggested he start antibiotics to help knock back his cough. He was feeling very weak and uncomfortable and I was worried he was developing pneumonia. He spent Friday night in his recliner.

I got up early on Saturday morning and my Dad was awake. He was complaining that he hadn't slept well, was up using the bathroom several times and was really full of congestion. He asked me to help put his slippers on as bending over made him cough. When I pulled the blanket off his feet, I looked at his feet and knew in an instant his problem wasn't a cold. His feet, ankles and lower legs were so swollen there was no definition between the parts. Even the arches of his feet were swollen to the point of having no arch. I looked at him and said, we need to get you to the hospital. He asked why. I said, you are having heart failure. All the fluid in your body has pooled in your feet and your heart can't pump it back up. He agreed to let me take him to the hospital, but we soon realized he was unable to get up and walk on his own. I got HB up and my Mom was up and we were able to help him realize the seriousness of his condition and I called 9-11. The ambulance was at our door in five minutes and within 30 they had my Dad with HB following, on the way to the hospital.

I need to refill my coffee and the sun is now up. I don't mean to jar you back to 2013 so abruptly, but I think this is far enough in the story to take a break.  I need to take some time to digest all of this-I haven't thought much about those early days in a while. So much happened, so quickly, so soon after, that the early days are easily forgotten.

My parents were married 57 years and their lives were entwined early in childhood in their small Indiana town. It is reasonable to expect their ends would also be entwined and connected. The weekend of their wedding anniversary, Oct. 1, they renewed their vows before their congregation. That was the weekend I was home sick with a bad cold. I wanted to be there, but my Mom said,  you weren't there for the first one, you don't need to be here for the last.

Dancing to their song; At Time Goes By at our wedding in 2003.

Culinary Throwback

Growing up in Chicago, one of my favorite places to go for dinner was a place called Hackney's on Lake. Hackney's is an old family restaurant, still in existence with several locations in the Chicago area. They were always really busy and my Dad would put our name in and we'd sit waiting for our name to be called.

Hackney's has an Irish theme, and the restaurant on Lake has several dining rooms. When your name was called over the loud speaker, it was announced with a dining room destination. I can still remember being so intrigued by all the names of the dining rooms...they sounded so mysterious and exotic! I always hoped we'd be called to the Shillelagh Room because I loved how it sounded. Sheh-Lay-La Room. Like Shangri La.

Hackney's is famous for their Hackney burger and their loaves of fried onions.  A loaf of fried onions were very thinly sliced onions, tossed in very light batter, packed into a deep fryer basket (which is shaped like a loaf), fried and turned out onto a plate with paper towels and served in all it's greasy glory. We'd get a half-loaf and I can still remember my Dad groaning in pleasure as he dug in.

A Hackney's burger is a half-pound beast, grilled and topped with sauteed onions, a slice of American cheese on their homemade dark pumpernickel rye. They are the stuff of legends. They are the stuff of dreams.

Given that we live about 6 hours from the nearest Hackney's, I have to get my fix somehow.

Last night I made Hackney burgers. (I skipped the onion loaf--it seemed gastrointestinally prudent.)
Here's the recipe; enjoy. (And we ate them all up before I took pictures! Use your imagination!)

My Version of Hackney's Burgers

 



This makes enough for 3-1/3 pound hamburgers. We each ate one and HB has one extra for lunch this week.

1 pound of good quality hamburger-80/20 mix. I use Thousand Hills Beef from Minnesota
1 Medium Sweet or Red onion, thinly sliced
3 T Vegetable or Olive Oil
Kosher Salt
Sharp Cheddar American Cheese
Dark Pumpernickel Bread (I like Pepperidge Farm)

You will need two skillets, one preferably should be cast iron.

In the non-cast iron skillet, heat 2 T of the oil and add the onions. Saute over medium heat, stirring frequently until lightly browned. Sprinkle lightly with kosher salt, turn down heat and continue to saute on very low heat until soft and caramel colored. Stir frequently but carefully not to break down the onions as they soften.

Meanwhile, begin preheating the cast iron skillet.

Open the beef package and do not handle the beef! If you have a one pound package, using a sharp knife, cut the beef into three equal-sized portions.  Carefully flatten to 1/2" thickness, smoothing edges. Make a large indentation in the center, which leaves it thinner in the middle than on the sides. This helps prevent your burger from becoming a hockey puck! Overworking ground beef results in tough burgers--just flatten. Sprinkle each burger with a generous sprinkle of kosher salt. Shape the burger in an oblong shape to match the bread.

Add 2-3 additional T of vegetable oil to the cast iron skillet and swirl. Add the burgers. They will sizzle!  Leave on medium high heat to caramelize the beef. Cook about 3 minutes and gently turn the burgers. If they stick, leave them another minute..they will release when they are ready to turn. Cook on second side about 4 minutes. Turn once again and cook another 2-3 minutes until an internal temperature of 155 degrees. (If you don't have one, get an instant read stick thermometer. They are the cheapest way to avoid E coli.) Remove from heat.

Top each burger with equal portions of the sauteed onions and top with 1 1/2 slices of American cheese. Allow to rest a minute or two to melt the cheese and relax the burger. Serve on the pumpernickel bread with ketchup and large sliced kosher dill pickles.

These are the best burgers you will ever have. Promise.

Beef! It's What's for Dinner!

I'm sorry that last post was such a downer. I should post spoiler warnings when I'm in a funk!  I haven't entirely processed the experience of caring for my parents with their rapid decline and deaths and I will probably use this place as a way to give myself a chance to offload some of the burden. I think when you share an experience with others (at the time of the experience) you create a language between you that helps ease the weight of it all. Aside from my husband, who for the most part needed to stay home and work while I cared for my folks at their home 300 miles away, I had no one to share the experience with. So I internalized much of it and just soldiered on, and now, two years later, many of the memories and less obvious emotions are simmering to the surface.  Two years later, it feels really random to discuss this stuff with friends, they don't know what to say, I'm sure they're thinking "it's time to move on"  or "we have our own issues..." so here, in my little confessional, I can let it out.  Bear with me, it's just something I need to do.

On a brighter note, the days are getting longer and it feels like spring is waiting patiently for winter to pack her bags and move on.  It's still cold, the threat of snow and ice will be around for another 2-3 months but the sun is warmer, the days are longer and there's less winter ahead now than behind us. I think when you live less north than Minnesota or other northern states, you don't notice the earth's angle to the sun as dramatically. Up here, on June 26, we have almost 18 hours of daylight. On December 26, we have less than 10. I have a window in my office that overlooks a hallway that overlooks an outside window. There are four weeks each year, two in the spring, two in the fall, where the sun's angle hits metal flashing on the roof of the building across the street that fires laser beans of sunlight into my office and nearly blinds me. I have to close my blinds the beams are so strong! That day is coming fast!

Despite my yearnings for spring, I still cook like it's winter. As promised, I'm going to share my Wine Braised Beef recipe with you. This is a recipe that my Mom used to make, my only riff on it is that I use shallots instead of onions and wine instead of all broth.  It's delicious and a really flexible recipe (as I'll describe late) that can be changed to suit your tastes and pantry stock!  This is a great recipe to have in your arsenal. You can really dazzle friends and family with this one.

Wine Braised Beef

 

Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Remove middle rack to make room for dutch oven or large oven proof pan with a tight fitting lid that needs to sit in the bottom 1/4 of the oven.

 

Olive Oil

4 pounds boneless Beef Chuck Roast (The one pictured in this recipe was 4 1/2 pounds)

1/3 cup Flour mixed with 1 teaspoon ground Black Pepper

1 large Shallot, chopped in 1/4 dice (You can sub one small onion and 3 large garlic cloves)

3 Bay Leaves

2 T Worcestershire Sauce

1 bottle Red Wine (Inexpensive is great. I used Shiraz. It's excellent with Burgundy, Merlot, Cabernet)

3 cups Beef Stock or Broth (low sodium)

For the sauce later:

Kosher Salt

2 T Butter

1 pound Mushrooms, thickly sliced

2 T flour

 

Prepare the meat: Cut the roast into three equal pieces. Cut away any large solid bands of fat, but leave the inner marbling and some smaller pieces. The rind of fat around the outside is not necessary to the end result of this dish other than making the gravy greasy. 

 

In a cast-iron Dutch oven or other large heavy oven-proof pan with a tight fitting lid, heat enough olive oil to cover the bottom of the pan. I used about 4 T of olive oil. I do this over medium heat until I am ready to brown the meat, then I turn it to high. I will adjust the heat as needed during the browning process.

 

Mix the flour and black pepper together and dredge the beef pieces in the flour, coating all the sides including the cut sides. Knock off the excess flour.

 

When a drop of water skitters in the pan, add your beef--but do it in batches. Crowding the beef in the pan will steam it and not brown it. This is a messy process as the beef and oil spatter! (I hate cleaning up a mess so I covered my stove with foil ahead of time!) Be patient--there is chemistry going on here! When the meat is sufficiently browned, it will release itself from the bottom of the pan and will be easy to turn! Using tongs flip the meat and brown all the sides including the edges. If the meat sticks, give it a little more time.  When browned, remove the meat to a plate, add more olive oil to your pan as needed and repeat til all your meat is well browned and resting on a plate.

 

Turn the heat to medium and add more olive oil if necessary (you may not need it) and saute the shallots (or onion and garlic) until just lightly browned. You just want to give them a little color. Scrape up as much of the browned bits on the bottom as possible! That's the good stuff!

 

When your shallots (or onion and garlic) are lightly browned, turn off the heat and push the shallots to the middle of the pan and add your beef pieces back in around them. Pour any accumulated juices from the plate into the pan.

Here's when you have to eyeball a little! You will want to add a 2 to 1 ratio of wine to broth to the pan. Depending on the thickness of your beef--you want to add enough wine and broth to JUST come to within 1/2 " of the top edge of the beef.  You do not want to fully cover or immerse your beef in liquid--just enough to almost come to the top. I used about 3/4 of the bottle of wine and 1 cup or so of broth.

 

Add the Bay Leaves and Worcestershire Sauce and give the pan a hearty sprinkle of freshly cracked pepper. Cover and put in the preheated oven. Sit back and let the magic happen for about 3 hours. After three hours, carefully remove the lid (watch for steam!) and test your meat for doneness. A large fork or thin knife inserted into the thickest part of the meat should go in easily or the meat should pull apart with little resistance. If it's still a little firm or resistant, cover and give it another 45-60 minutes.  That should be plenty of time! This is the hard part because your house is going to smell insanely good and you have to be patient and WAIT for dinner!

 

Remove the pan from the oven and carefully lift the beef out of the liquid and put on a rimmed dish and cover with foil. Set aside.

 

CAREFULLY pour the cooking liquid into a mixing bowl. The narrower the bowl the easier it will be to skim the accumulated fat off the top.  Set aside and allow to cool.

 

Over medium heat, add the butter to the pan. When it's melted and sizzling, add the mushrooms and saute until lightly browned. Sprinkle 2 T flour over the mushrooms and stir to remove any lumps. When the flour is incorporated, add the remaining bottle of wine and another 1 cup of beef stock or broth. Bring to a full boil, stirring constantly to prevent sticking and clumping about 5 minutes. This will reduce the wine and thicken the gravy. When the gravy is thickened, reduce heat to the lowest warm setting. 

 

Returning to the saved pan sauce, carefully skim any accumulated fat off the top. Remove the bay leaves. You can strain the pan sauce if you wish, I like to leave the little bits. Add the pan sauce to the mushroom gravy. Taste the gravy. This is when you'd add a generous sprinkle of kosher salt to taste.

 

Place meat on a cutting board and cut into serving sizes. You can serve this with mashed potatoes, rice, polenta or as I did, with parsley buttered egg noodles. You can add the meat back into the gravy or as I did, put the noodles in a large bowl, add the beef to the side and drizzle the whole bowl with the wine mushroom sauce. It was succulent and delicious.

 

This keeps well and you can reheat it in the gravy. You can also create a lovely beef stew by steaming carrots and green beans and adding that to the beef and gravy as a change for leftovers.

 

 

You can also use beer instead of wine, onions and garlic instead of shallots and you can add thyme or rosemary along with the bay. I wanted something straightforward and classic.

 

 

You can see my foil protection! And look at that browned goodness! You know that stuff that sticks to the bottom of the pan that gives everything such a great flavor?

That's called fond. I think it's because we're so fond of it!

 

You don't need to cook your shallots past this point--just gently sauteed.

 

Add the liquid just to within 1/2" of the top of the meat.

 

 

 

YUM YUM YUM

 

 

This sauce is fantastic. Savory and little tangy from the wine.

 

MMMMMMM

Make this, it's good!!!

 

 

 





Ash Wednesday

I have a post almost ready to go that includes a recipe for Wine Braised Beef...but I am not quite done with it.

And it's Ash Wednesday and it doesn't seem right posting about beef on Ash Wednesday.


I've had a heavy heart today. I feel like I've been pushing back a heavy dark blanket all day, wrestling with it and getting tangled up and pretty soon, I'm going to give up.

My Mom died on Ash Wednesday. It was March 9, so technically it isn't the true anniversary of her passing, but it was Ash Wednesday nonetheless.

I suppose people who lose a loved one on Easter or Mother's Day or other movable holiday can appreciate this. You have two completely different days to endure the emotions and battle the fatigue of grief.

I've lost loved ones before, but losing a parent (or a spouse or child) is like a piano being dropped on your head. Other grief, losing a distant relative or friend is a paper cut in comparison. When we learned my Mom's cancer was stage 4 metastatic breast cancer and her chance of 5 year survival was under 5%, I began to picture the coming weeks and months like waiting at a train station; the train could be seen in the distance and barrelling down the tracks. It comes up fast on the station, pauses briefly and then roars past blowing up leaves and dust and messing up your hair and getting grit in your eyes before blowing off into the horizon.  I don't know why that imagery came to me, but I think I had this crazy notion that losing a beloved was linear...you prepare as you can for their passing, you endure the numbing, searing empty grief in the immediacy of their death and that the rest of your life is spent listening to the distant train whistle as grief fades into fond memories.

I was wrong. Or maybe I was right, and that is how some people experience grief. We all experience grief, that's life. But how we experience it and cope and endure are different. Grief is not a train barrelling down the tracks passing in a blast of dust and steam. No, I think a better metaphor for grief are the tides of the ocean. Coming in waves, going out with high tide, raging in during a storm and being gone during glorious weather. The worst are rogue waves, or as I call it, stealth grief. That inexplicable moment when something triggers a memory, or a desire to tell your loved one something you think they'd love to hear, or just the longing for their company, that damn rogue wave comes out of nowhere and knocks you on your ass.

My Mom's birthday was March 8. She died the next day, which was Ash Wednesday. She slept most of the day, nodding when I'd ask her if she needed anything, smiling weakly when I told her I loved her and giving my hand a frighteningly hard grip when I lay beside her in her final hours. My Dad sat on one side of her and I on the other. We knew her time was coming to an end, but we didn't know how soon or what it would look like. We prayed the Hail Mary. My Dad asked if we could pray the Our Father. My Mom seemed to be asleep, peaceful. Her breathing had quieted from the loud raspy struggling breath from earlier to almost a sigh. Sigh in, sigh out. She'd gotten many lovely prayer cards from friends and I picked one up and told my Dad I wanted to read it. I can't share the entire prayer, partly because I don't remember it in detail and partly because I don't want to remember that much of the detail. One line that repeated at the end of each stanza was "Let God and Let Go..." and the prayer ended with that...and..my Mom was gone. Her hand was still holding mine. My Dad was holding her other hand.  There was no more sigh in, sigh out.

We looked at each other. My Dad said, "Is that it?" We both looked at her closely and her face, which had been furrowed in pain for weeks, was line-free and peaceful. I said, "Dad, she's gone home to Jesus. She's with her family now, with Julie and Nita and Virginia and her Daddy and Auntie Barb and Uncle Stan and Bernice..."

There's more. It's private. I can't. Maybe someday I'll allow myself to go there. I was in my parent's home, HB was 5 hours away at our home church getting ashes. I texted him and as he was accepting God's grace and humility in ashes, my Mom was going home. He called me when he could and shared our news with our Pastor who prayed with him. I called Hospice and they came out, and then the Funeral Home came. Three hours later my Dad and I were alone. I made us dinner. We cried. Exhaustion was overwhelming both of us.

Two years my Mom has been gone. My Dad followed her home on Pentecost Sunday and I love that my parents, lifelong Catholics, bookended the Easter season.

I miss you Mom. I miss your humor, your snark, your endless chatter about coupons and recipes and random people you knew. I miss being able to call you and vent about my day or my life. I miss your counsel.  I miss you buying me gifts on super clearance where the store owes you money to take the merchandise out their inventory, then you telling me how you got my gift so cheap. I miss you busting HB's chops. I miss you. I love you.

By Request

HB and I were talking about my blog.

He reads it when I remind him I have a  blog. He can never remember the name of it, but this is the same person who can't remember my gmail address which is my firstnamelastname@ gmaildotcom.

He suggested that I should be a food blogger. I protested! I don't want to do a food blog. This is my musings and rants space! This is where I observe life and share heart-warming stories!

He thought that since I love to cook, am a passably good cook, do food for a living and have shelves of cookbooks and files of recipes, perhaps it might not be out of the realm of possibility that I include recipes on my blog.

But I don't want to futz with taking pictures! I don't want to be constrained by recipes! Exact measures! Testing and testing! Wasting food! It's all too much! I just want to say, "this was yummy-make it!"

Then I thought about it. I do have a lot of great recipes I'd love to share. I can take reasonably non-nauseating photos if pressed.  I can live within the constraints of measurements and I'm sure all 3 of you that read this blog will know what I mean when I say a dash of this or a handful of that. Right?

Well, since there's no time like the present, I present:

Caramel Apple Spiced Dutch Baby Pancake.

 

 

Last weekend a FB friend posted photos of her Dutch Baby pancake and I realized I hadn't made one of those in ages and it looked delicious. So this morning, I got up and got to work. Here's the result.

(And I promise to figure out how to do printable recipes at some point. In the meantime, if you want this, copy and paste it to a Word doc and print it. Easy, right!?)

Dutch Baby Pancake is also known as Pannekoeken. It's a baked egg pancake, simply made with flour, eggs, vanilla and milk. Of course, it can only get better from there, as it's a beautiful foundation for other ingredients; pears, apples, blueberries, plain with fresh berries...you name it. I had apples in the fridge so it was an easy decision to make Caramel Apple Spice. There's a restaurant here in town named Pannekoeken and when you order one, the server comes running to your table with it singing "Pannekoeken! Pannekoeken!" so it arrives hot, pre-deflation and in all it's delicious glory.

Caramel Apple Spiced Dutch Baby Pancake
Preheat oven to 450 degrees.
Prep-10 minutes, Bake 15-20 minutes.
Makes 6 servings.

4 T butter
1/4 c. packed light brown sugar
2 t. cinnamon
1/2 t. freshly grated nutmeg
2 medium apples (firm baking apples) peeled and sliced.

In a cast-iron or oven-safe 8" skillet, melt the butter and stir in the brown sugar and spices. Melt and add the apples. On medium heat saute the apples, stirring to coat and soften about 5 minutes.  Turn heat to very low or warm and prepare the batter:

4 Eggs
1 C Flour
1 C. Milk
1 t. Vanilla

In a blender, break the eggs, sprinkle in the flour, add the milk and vanilla and a dash of salt. Blend on high, scraping the sides of the blender cup to incorporate all the flour, about 1 minutes. It will be frothy.

Pour the egg batter over the sauteed apples-do not stir. Immediately put in the center of a preheated 450 degree oven and set the timer for 14 minutes. Do not open oven to peek!

At 14 minutes, check the Dutch Baby. It will have climbed up the sides and will be puffy in the center. It should be just set. If the eggs are still shiny or look wet, give the pancake one more minute.

Remove from oven and let set 2 minutes before cutting. It will settle.
Cut with a sharp knife into 6 wedges. Use a spatula to remove--it may stick a little if your pan was not well seasoned or isn't non-stick. A messy Dutch Baby is still a delicious Dutch Baby!

Serve with either a sprinkle of powdered sugar or a drizzle of maple syrup and a side of peppered bacon or spicy pork sausage. MMM!
Enjoy!

 

Ingredients everyone has on hand. Not shown-milk.

It was being camera-shy.

 

It took every ounce of will  not to just eat sauteed apples for breakfast.

 

This was after 30 second blended, 1 scrape down and another 30 seconds.

Perfect! 

Testing my ability to take pictures with iphone and pour.

Glad I didn't drop the phone or pour the batter all over the floor!

 

End of batter in the skillet. Ready for the oven!

 

I realize this may not look so yummy. I will need to dig out my good camera and put it to use.

 It smelled fabulous!

 

This was yummy! Make it!