Sweet Treats for Easter

With Easter coming up this weekend, most families in Denver are planning their annual traditions.  For some, it is church, followed by brunch in Denver with the whole family. For others, the holiday starts at the crack of dawn with an egg hunt and easter baskets and brunch at home.  Whatever your tradition, everyone wants some easy pre-made breakfast treats on hand to go with their morning coffee! After all, a big Easter brunch may be several hours away! Here are a few of our favorite recipes for Easter morning that work well for before, during, or even after Easter brunch.

 

French Toast Bake

We love this recipe because you can prepare it the night before and just pop it in the oven when you are ready to nosh on Easter morning!

 

Ingredients:

6 large eggs

1 1/2 c. whole milk

1 c. heavy cream

1/2 c. granulated sugar

1/2 tsp. ground cinnamon

1 tsp. pure vanilla extract

pinch of nutmeg

1/2 tsp. kosher salt

1 loaf white bread, preferably day old

Powdered sugar, for serving

Maple syrup, for serving

strawberries, for serving (optional)

 

Directions

  1. In a large bowl, whisk together eggs, milk, heavy cream, sugar, cinnamon, vanilla, nutmeg, and salt.
  2. Dunk bread slices in the egg mixture then arrange them in a tall baking dish, standing up. Pour extra egg mixture over bread. Cover and refrigerate, 2 hours, or up to overnight.
  3. Bake in oven on 375° until the tops of the bread are golden and crunchy, about 45 minutes.
  4. Sift powdered sugar on top of the French toast bake. Serve warm with maple syrup and strawberries, if desired.

 

Lemon Poppyseed Loaf

Prepare this delicious, sunshiney breakfast bread ahead of time and then slice and go!  Whether you are chasing tots around the yard on their egg hunt, or getting everyone in the car to go to church and brunch, this is the perfect pre-breakfast treat!

 

Ingredients

1 2/3 c. all-purpose flour

3 tbsp. poppy seeds

1 tsp. baking powder

1/4 tsp. baking soda

1/2 tsp. kosher salt

1/2 c. butter, softened

1 c. granulated sugar

Zest of 2 lemons

3 large eggs

1/2 c. yogurt

1/4 c. skim milk

Juice of 1 1/2 lemons, divided, plus small wedges for serving

1 tsp. pure vanilla extract

2 c. powdered sugar

Directions:

  1. Preheat oven to 350° and grease a 9”-x-5” loaf pan with cooking spray. Line pan with parchment paper and grease parchment paper with cooking spray.
  2. In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, poppy seeds, baking soda, baking powder, and salt.
  3. In a large bowl using a hand mixer, combine butter, sugar, and lemon zest and beat until light and fluffy. Add eggs one at a time, mixing well between each addition. Add yogurt, milk, 1 tablespoon lemon juice and vanilla and mix until fully incorporated.
  4. Add flour mixture to the egg mixture in 3 additions, stirring at low speed between each one. Stir until batter is just combined, then pour batter into prepared pan and bake until the loaf is golden and a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean, 50 to 55 minutes.
  5. Let loaf cool in pan for 15 minutes then carefully transfer to cooling rack to cool completely. When the loaf has cooled, whisk together powdered sugar and remaining 2 tablespoons lemon juice to make glaze. Pour over loaf and garnish with lemon wedges.

 

And remember, we’ll be open on Easter so bring your family in for brunch!  From all of us at The Original Pancake House in Denver, Happy Easter to you and yours!


Burger

Easter has hopped on...what do you do with all those eggs?

So you have a fridge full of hard boiled eggs and an enormous hunk of ham leftover from your Easter egg hunt and Easter dinner?  One of the best things about any holiday is the leftovers!  But sometimes you have to get creative.  Here are a few scrumptious ideas for your Easter leftovers.

 

Easter Leftover Sandwich - This is the ultimate leftover meal for Easter as it puts all your leftover items to good use.  Biscuits topped with ham, egg salad, lettuce, tomato, and avocado?  Hope you have a hearty appetite for this delicious leftover lunch!

 

Ham and Cheese Quesadillas - Turn your Easter leftovers into dinner with ham and cheese quesadillas.  This recipe uses just four ingredients and is kid-friendly!  You can use any type of cheese, chop up that giant hunk of leftover Easter ham, and serve with fruit salad or veggies for dinner.

 

Ham and Cheese Potato Casserole - Yum.  This crowd pleasing dish is comfort food at its best.  Plus you can make one and freeze one and use up all your leftover ham before the week is out!

 

Deviled Eggs - If those all those hard boiled eggs are losing their appeal at breakfast, try making them into deviled eggs for an afternoon snack or hearty appetizer.  Add a bit of spice to kick them up a notch!

 

From all of your friends at The Original Pancake House in Denver, we hope you had a wonderful Easter holiday!  We hope to see you for breakfast in Denver soon!


Original Jessica Egg

EGGstravagant Easter Eggs!

Easter is one of our favorite holidays as we always enjoy a big family brunch with our loved ones.  But the highlight for the little ones is usually the Easter Bunny and of course the Egg Hunt!  We love decorating our own Easter Eggs and each year we try to come up with a few fun new ideas to surprise the kids.  Here are a few of our favorite Easter Egg ideas:

Easter Chick Eggs:

First dye your Easter Eggs yellow with traditional egg dye.  Once the dye has dried, use a permanent marker to draw eyes, a beak, and cute little wings.Original_Jessica-Yonker-Easter-Egg-Decorating-Dip-Dye-Beauty_s4x3.jpg.rend.hgtvcom.966.725

Neon Dip-Dyed Eggs:

Use bright or neon colored dye for these eggs.  Wrap small strips of tape around eggs and dip parts of the eggs in different color dyes.  Remove tap when finished to reveal stripes of natural shell color.  Experiment with overlapping colors and angles.

Glitter Eggs:

Dye eggs in a variety of colors.  Once dye has dried, use glue to create lined design patterns or polka dots.  Gently roll eggs in glitter allowing the sparkles to adhere to the glue strips.  Shake of excess glitter and allow eggs to fully dry.  Alternatively, you can skip the dye and cover the whole egg in glue and then roll in glitter to create beautiful and sparkly eggs.

Tattoo Eggs:

Tattoo eggs are a cute idea for slightly older children.  Purchase a variety of temporary tattoos - Spiderman, butterflies, hearts, etc., any design will work!  Follow instructions to adhere tattoos to eggs.  Either overlap images to cover entire egg, or select one larger image to feature on each egg.

Of course we adults love watching the Egg Hunt, but our highlight is usually the Easter Brunch that follows.  If you’re up all night decorating eggs, join us for Easter breakfast or brunch in Denver.  We’ll be happy to feed the whole family!  Happy Easter from your friends at the Original Pancake House!


Bunny Pancakes

Hippity Hoppity, Easter Is On Its Way!

One of our favorite Easter traditions is to take our family out to a nice breakfast in Denver to celebrate the holiday.  But, on the years that we stay home, we love to make a bunny pancake breakfast for our family and neighbors.  Bunny pancakes, plus all the rest of the traditional Easter breakfast fixings, are an easy way to add a little hippity-hop to your breakfast or brunch spread.  Here are a few ideas to bring the Easter Bunny to your breakfast table.

Bunny-Pancakes

  1. Begin with your favorite pancake recipe and create batter.
  2. Determine if you have had enough coffee to have a steady hand when spooning out the batter. Bunny pancakes can be made either by dolloping the batter into a bunny face (circle) and ears (two ovals attached to the face), or by simply creating the bunny face and then adding ears using pieces of fruit once the pancake has cooked.
  3. When creating the bunny face, place two blueberries or chocolate chips in the liquid batter as soon as you have spooned it onto your frying pan. You can also add a nose and whiskers using various fruits and chopped fruit shapes.  Get creative!  If you are adding batter bunny ears, let the face (circle) set for a minute or two on the pan before you attempt to add each ear.  Gently spoon batter into an elongated ear shape on each side and connect to the bunny face.  Be careful when flipping!
  4. If batter ears sound too challenging, try using cantaloupe, pineapple, or bananas for the ears. Arrange your bunny pancake face on the center of the plate and add the fruit to create ears.  Try using strips of bacon or sausage to create whiskers.
  5. Serve and enjoy!

If you are too exhausted after your Easter egg hunt to make your own bunny pancakes, join us at Original Pancake House for a scrumptious brunch.  With almost thirty egg dishes, plus pancakes, waffles, and crepes, we have plenty of choices for a delicious, traditional Easter brunch.  Happy Easter Denver!


Eggstravaganza

Eggstra Special Easter Traditions

2014 Eggstravaganza FB cover_Final

Brightly decorated eggs, the Easter Bunny, oodles of chocolate, and a family brunch are all integral parts of most annual Easter traditions.  Since we are celebrating our Eggstravaganza at the Original Pancake House this month, we decided to explore the history of Easter eggs to find out where this tradition began.

 

Though today Easter eggs are associated with the Christian holiday of Easter, the tradition of decorating and painting eggs extends back to ancient times.  As a symbol of life and rebirth, decorated eggs have been found in ancient civilizations in Africa, South and Central America, and Mesopotamia.  For example, Iranians have been decorating eggs for many thousands of years in honor of their new year’s holiday of Nowruz, which coincides with the spring equinox.  The Easter egg as we know it today may have pagan roots as part of a springtime and rebirth celebration that occurred each year and involved an egg hunt.

 

In the Christian religion, Easter eggs are symbols of the resurrection and rebirth of Jesus Christ.  In Orthodox and Eastern Orthodox churches, eggs are dyed red to represent the blood that Christ shed on the cross. The egg’s hard shell represents the Tomb of Christ and the cracking of the shell represents his resurrection. Easter egg rolling is representative of the rolling away of the stone in front of Christ’s tomb.  In A.D. 1610 under Pope Paul V, the Christian Church officially adopted the Easter egg as a symbol of the resurrection. These Easter traditions originated in Europe and Eastern Europe and were brought to the United States over the past century by immigrant families.  Today we continue to celebrate Easter with many of these old traditions including an Easter egg roll on the White House lawn and backyard Easter egg hunts.

 

However you plan to celebrate this Easter holiday, be it with an egg hunt or just a gathering of family and friends for brunch in Denver; the Original Pancake House wishes you a very happy Easter and a wonderful spring!