You are in for a treat today! Leah’s a little busy right now, so I’ll be doing the Sunday recipe post. This also means I’m either writing about a staple from my bachelor days or about something I ate a lot growing up. This recipe falls into the latter category, therefore today is all about orange pancakes, everyone—the best breakfast you could ever have!

Quite honestly, orange pancakes are the only way I eat pancakes. I think my dad invented this recipe, and when I was younger friends visiting for sleepovers and whatnot would comment that orange pancakes were a bit weird. But then they’d come around, and I have no doubt they’re still eating orange pancakes to this day. Everyone also loves breakfast-for-dinner, perhaps because a “proper” breakfast can take a long time to make. When I wake up I’m usually hungry and impatient, so this is a dinner, spruced up with eggs and bacon, though please feel free to use this recipe any time of the day and with whatever sides you wish.

For the pancakes you will need:

• Pancake mix
• Orange juice

You could make the pancakes from scratch, but this is a Jeff post (I’m an English teacher), not a Leah post (she’s a dietitian), so that’s how things are going to go. Now, for the directions:

1. Follow directions on the pancake mix
2. But wherever it says to “add water,” add orange juice instead (rebel!)

And that’s it. The taste is subtle, but I really do think it’s superior to what I’m calling “water pancakes.” Of course, top your pancakes with maple syrup, butter, whip cream, or whatever else you like. For this particular meal Leah and I decided to open up a can of maple syrup that our French-Canadian neighbor brought us from Quebec. I was really excited to try it, because I’ve never seen syrup that came in a can, and yes indeed it was delicious. It does make me wonder if syrup comes in cans in the States—if anyone has seen anything similar from Vermont, Pennsylvania, or New York, I’d like to know.

Leah and I ate our pancakes with a side of eggs, scrambled. As for why I bought blue eggs, I’ve been seeing these at the store for months and I wanted an excuse to try them. Overall, they tasted just like regular eggs, though perhaps with just a hint of Dr. Seuss. Also, I used medium-pulp orange juice here, and I feel like heavy pulp would work well with something like bran pancakes. If you look at the pictures, there’s a nice gradient from when I made the first pancake to the last, going darker to lighter, which I feel like always happens. The last five or so have a wonderful orange hue, and they taste like orange. Which, as I hope you find out, is just perfect.

–Jeff and Leah