Pancake Month at Clinton St. Baking Company

When my brother Josh and I were little, we knew that staying at our grandparents' house meant we'd get to eat pancakes for breakfast, lunch and dinner. We both just loved our grandmother's pancakes, and when you're a kid, what could possibly be better than eating nothing but big, fluffy pancakes for 3 meals a day?

Clinton St. Baking Company in the Lower East Side is known for their incredibly delicious pancakes, and they have deemed February 'Pancake Month' where they feature a new flavor each night of the week. My friend Michelle devised the brilliant plan to have some of the girls over to her apartment, also in the Lower East Side, and get a pancake dinner delivered since the actual restaurant is a very small space with waits sometimes exceeding 2 hours. I love my friends for a lot of reasons, but their enthusiasm for this idea just reinforced why they're my friends in the first place.

Last week, we all sat around Michelle's coffee table in her beautiful 1-bedroom apartment and listened as she placed our order over the phone. The woman on the other end of the phone joked, "Wow, is this all for you?" to which Michelle replied, "Yeah, I'm REALLY hungry!" Our order came to over $100 (don't judge!) and we anxiously awaited the delivery of our meal. That night the special was Crunchy Banana Pancakes with Cinnamon Chili Chocolate Sauce and my friend Caroline and I decided to split 1 order and a side of Onion Rings. Yes, of course I had to get something savory on the side since pancakes are typically sweet.

When the buzzer rang, we literally cheered with excitement. The delivery guy dropped off our 2 huge bags of food and we got to work handing out each container to its proper owner. Once all the girls had their food, we dug in.

I was really happy that Caroline and I had decided to split an order of pancakes, because these suckers were very sweet. I had to skip the butter that came on the side, but I poured a healthy amount of maple syrup all over my portion and the liquid began to disappear, being soaked up by the porous pancakes.

Slightly crispy around the edges, soft and light in the middle and covered in crunchy bananas, I was delighted by the textures that mingled on my tongue. I only used a small amount of the chocolate sauce, but it truly made the meal since the result reminded me the of banana/chocolate chip pancakes I used to eat when I was little. I put the Onion Rings on the plate right alongside the pancakes, and the salt enhanced the flavor of the pancakes to create the perfect bite. Some maple syrup definitely ended up on those onion rings, but somehow it worked and was absolutely delicious. The Onion Rings were not the typical fake fried circular version that you get at a lot of restaurants. You could tell these were homemade, irregular in shape and covered in a skin that was flaky and lighter than I expected.

I cleaned every last drop of food from my plate and leaned back on the couch as the food coma began to settle in.

While I may have been able to eat pancakes several times a day when I was 6 years old, 20 years later one serving is about all I can handle. All the girls enjoyed their pancakes, orders ranged from the Crunchy Banana with Onion Rings to Blueberry Pancakes with a side omelet to just Regular Pancakes, and there was barely a bite left over by the end. My friend Meg was kind enough to save a few bites to bring home to her boyfriend, but like I said, I cleared my plate. Sorry Patrick!

If you haven't had a chance to try Clinton St. Baking Company's pancakes, hurry and get them soon to take advantage of Pancake Month, or head down to the Lower East Side and wait for a table that will be well worth your time. I'm so happy I got to avoid the wait, but still enjoy the pancakes with my friends.

How do you feel about eating breakfast food for dinner? Do you think there are pancakes in NYC better than Clinton Street's? Let me know, I'll have to check them out.

Let's Eat!
-The Fabulous Foodie