Pancakes are not unheard of in the parts of India that I come from – South India. Although these are not called as pancakes, they are technically pancakes. We have a wide variety of pancake recipes ranging from dosa, set dosa, uthappam, kara dosa, masala dosa and many more. In fact, in every street of Bangalore one can see road side stalls selling 99 varieties of dosas. Not only these are yummy, they are quite simple to prepare as well. At our house, morning breakfast includes these dosas (Indian pancakes) and I couldn’t miss this pancake challenge when I first saw it at Natascha’s. Lina then wrote a reminder post that there are pancake recipes up for grabs and I really couldn’t give it a miss.
Pancakes have been on my to-do list since long and only grouse with the otherwise fluffy pillows of utter deliciousness is the use of eggs. I had been planning on trying an egg-less version but for some reason, it never seems to happen. With this pancake challenge, I had so many options to choose from – each a variety of pancake from a specific country/region. From the entire list, Cachapa seemed to grab my attention and immediately I started looking out for a recipe. As luck would have it, these Cachapas used no eggs. Yay!! 😀 I did a little gig and immediately picked them up. Natascha was sweet to let me try them out.
Cachapas are Venezuelan corn cakes or pancakes made with corn kernels. Just like the dosa centers in South India, Cachapas seem to be one of the best street foods in Venezuela. And guess what, they are a popular breakfast item too. Since my love for sweetcorn is well known in this blog, I need not say I was bubbling with excitement while making these. Some versions of Cachapa called out for a mozzarella cheese filling while some used sour cream. I decided to combine couple of my favorites – cheese and corn. It indeed was out of the world and the Cachapas were gone in no time at all. Nothing fancy, super simple and yet, amazing. I have made only one replacement in the recipe – I used corn flour (just a little to bind) while most of the recipes seemed to use Masa Harina. Having not tasted the original, we found this version to be quite tasty.
Sweetcorn Kernel, 1 cup Corn Flour, 2 tsp Salt, as required Black Pepper Powder, ½ teaspoon (or more) Mozzarella Cheese, as required Oil/Butter, to sprinkle
How I made –
In a mixer jar, grind the sweet corn kernels into a not so smooth paste. Do not add any water. For a chunkey version, reserve a few sweetcorn kernels and add them to the prepared batter.
Remove the prepared sweetcorn batter into a bowl. Add salt and black pepper powder. Add the corn flour and mix well.
Meanwhile, heat a flat pan/griddle (I used non-stick tawa). Take a small ladle full of batter and spread it into a small circle with ½ cm thickness. Sprinkle few drops of oil/butter around the pancake. Cook it on low/medium flame until the bottom is golden. Gently flip it to the other side. Sprinkle few drops of oil/butter again.
Once the other side is cooked as well, flip it again. Add cheese chunks/grated cheese all over the pancake. Wait for the cheese to melt and then, fold the pancake in half so that the cheese slightly oozes out. Repeat the same for rest of the pancakes.
Serve hot with a side of cheese 🙂 Note –
I had only American sweetcorn but luckily it was not too fresh (hah!) If the sweetcorn is very tender, water content could be more. Increase the corn flour quantity accordingly. Adjust spices as per preference. Keep the flame on low all the time and make sure both the sides are golden brown and are cooked through. Other variations are to serve this with sour cream or with salsa. For a low cal version, avoid cheese. They still taste great 🙂
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