Mini German Pancakes and triple berry sauce

Update 8/11/11
I made this again yesterday, but this time instead of berries I used peaches that I had chopped and frozen.  I also added 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon to the syrup.  I was trying to semi recreate peach puff pancake.  This wasn't as good as peach puff, but it was still quite yummy, and lots healthier, so I recommend experimenting with different fruits in the sauce.  Also, I thought of adding almond extract to the batter and maybe omitting the  orange zest.  I had oranges this time so I didn't, but I figure I'd better write myself this note to try for next time.)

Here is a fun recipe I made for breakfast yesterday. It was such a hit that I ended up making a second batch. I found this recipe on Real Mom Kitchen. She found it somewhere else, but I made it using her triple berry sauce, so I'm putting her link. Hers turned out way cuter than mine. I'll include my pictures so you can see, but click the above link if you want to see some really pretty ones.

Mini German Pancakes

Ingredients

• 1 cup milk
• 6 eggs
• 1 cup flour
• 1/2 tsp. salt
• 1 tsp. vanilla
• 1 tsp. orange zest (optional)
• 1/4 cup butter, melted

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. Blend first six ingredients (milk through orange zest) in a blender. Be careful to see that any flour clumps get well-blended.
2. Blend in butter a little at a time in order to temper the eggs.
3. Grease muffin tins well and distribute batter evenly between 18-24 tins. Bake for 15 minutes, or until puffy and golden on top.
4. Served with your favorite toppings. (We topped them with triple berry sauce from Real Mom kitchen)

Triple Berry Sauce

4 cups frozen berries
1 cup water
1/2 cup Xagave, agave or honey
2 Tbsp. cornstarch

Put berries and Xagave in sauce pan and bring to boil. (If using honey had have to water at this point.) Reduce heat to simmer. Mix cornstarch with water and stir until lumps are gone. Pour cornstarch mixture into berry mixture while stirring slowly. Stir until thickens (about 1 to 2 minutes) and begins to bubble.

I actually had some agave nectar that I had bought for some other recipe. I was actually excited to try it in something. I was surprised at how nice it turned out, and how nice it tasted.


Here are some pictures. The first batch I followed Real Mom's suggestion and used a 1/4 measuring cup. That only got me 14 pancakes. They looked like popovers coming out of the oven. and didn't flatten into cute little bowls, but did end up looking cute enough when filled.
Tavio insisted he was still starving so I made a second batch. This time I filled the tins closer to 1/2 full (to make a total of 18 like Real Mom had) and sprayed the tins with Baker's Joy which is supposed to be grease and flour. I ended up with the last 3 puffing like I figure all of them were suppose to. The ones that puffed came out of the pan quite nicely. The ones that didn't still stuck. In this batch, the ones that didn't puff as cutely did have a lovely cave on the bottom side of the pancake. I turned them over and filled them from the bottom.