Guess What We Found In These Prize-Winning Pancakes!

Question: Is it sacrilegious for a food editor to tout a recipe requiring instant rice? I mean, as far as I'm concerned, nothing (with perhaps the exception of food foam) is off the table when it comes to home-cooking. So, when this prize-winning recipe for Spiced Eggnog Pancakes — stay with me here — landed in my inbox, I was understandably intrigued. Who wouldn't be? Eden Dranger, the winner of the $350 prize in a Minute Rice recipe contest, accidentally discovered her secret to moist, hearty, slightly spiced pancakes back when she was a kid. “I convinced my mom to make pancakes for me," she told me recently. "And, while we had the pancake mix, we were missing almost everything else on the ingredient label. It was the holidays, so we had leftover eggnog and rice.” I'm not sure I would have put those two together, but it worked! And, honestly, instant rice is pretty handy to have in the house. Especially when coming home extremely tipsy and in need of some satisfying carb-loading, like, IMMEDIATELY. As an aside, here is a great stovetop equation I learned in college: instant rice
+ olive oil
+ a lot of parmesan
+ black pepper
____________________________
= perfect, quick, and easy, slightly Italian-inspired, carb-bomb to counteract obscene booze intake But, back to the prize-winning recipe at hand: these pancakes! While eggnog is not in season anymore, you can sub in equal parts milk and heavy cream with a pinch of nutmeg to get the same result. I'll be cooking these for myself and my hubby this weekend, watching these shows, and not going outside to brave sub-Arctic temps at ALL. Try them for yourself and let me know how it goes! Spiced Eggnog Pancakes
Serves 4 to 6 Ingredients
3/4 cup all-purpose flour
3 tbsp sugar
2 tsp baking powder
1 1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp salt
Pinch of nutmeg
1 cup eggnog (or 1/2 cup of milk and 1/2 cup of heavy cream)
1 cup cooked Minute® Brown Rice
2 tbsp unsalted butter, melted, or vegetable oil
1 large egg
1/4 to 1/2 cup raisins, depending on how much you like raisins
Vegetable oil, for cooking

Instructions
1. Whisk
together flour, sugar, baking powder, cinnamon, salt, and nutmeg, and set aside.

2. In a separate bowl, whisk together eggnog, rice, butter or oil, and the egg.

3. Add the dry ingredients to the eggnog mixture and stir until just
incorporated; fold in the raisins.

4. Heat up a
skillet or griddle over medium heat, and brush lightly with the vegetable oil.
Spoon batter by 1/4-cupfuls into the skillet, and cook until golden brown on the
bottom, and bubbles appear at the top and a few have burst — 1 to 2 minutes. 

5. Flip
and cook until browned on the bottom, another 1 to 2 minutes. 

6. Continue, keeping
the finished pancakes warm in the preheated oven if you'd like, until batter is
gone and you’re finished making all pancakes.