For R’s birthday, I took him to Morimoto in Napa for an amazing chef’s tasting menu. But since that wasn’t on his actual birthday, when the day rolled around I decided to whip up some pancakes for an added birthday treat brunch. I had a couple peaches laying around that needed to be eaten ASAP before they were no longer acceptably edible, so I decided to go real crazy and add them to the pancakes. And peachy pancakes were born!

What you’ll need:

• 1 cup flour
• 1 TBS baking powder
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp cinnamon
• 2 TBS maple syrup
• 1/2 cup almond milk
• 1/4 cup water
• 2 small ripe peaches, sliced small
• canola oil or other greasing agent for skillet
• maple syrup for drizzling

Mix flour, baking powder, salt and cinnamon in large mixing bowl. In separate bowl (or measuring cup) whisk together the wet ingredients. Add wet ingredients to the dry and stir until everything is mixed together.

Heat a skillet and add a bit of canola oil (or if you’re fancy and have a griddle, go for that!) to medium heat. Add batter in about 1/4 cup at a time. Once batter is in the pan, place sliced peaches into batter. After about 2-4 minutes, or when the batter starts to bubble, flip the pancake (this is always the hardest part for me!) and cook the other side. I work in batches of about 2 pancakes at a time, since it’s hard for me not to burn them otherwise (and even then it’s still hard!)

Serve the pancakes drizzled with maple syrup and topped with additional peaches. R raved about the first batch, and when I finally sat down to eat them I was pleasantly surprised as well. Definitely a yummy way to fancy up weekend brunch without putting forth a ton of effort.