LEMON AND POPPY SEED PANCAKES

Steps:

• Sift the flour, sugar and baking powder together into a large bowl. Add the butter and rub with the dry ingredients with your fingers to create a fine crumb mixture.
• Add the egg, milk and vanilla and whisk together by hand or use an electric whisk on medium speed for a few minutes or until well combined.
• Add the lemon rind, juice and poppy seeds and fold in carefully.
• The batter should be of pouring consistency and should be able to run out of a ladle by itself easily. If the batter is too thick to do this, add a splash of milk and mix until consistency is just right. If too runny, add some flour.
• Use a non stick frying pan on a medium heat for these pancakes. Ladle some batter into the pan until it has spread to the desired size.
• Wait for a minute then check for bubbles to form around the edge of the batter. Once you have seen that a bubble has burst and left a hole and has not been filled with runny batter, it is time to flip the pancake (I do this using a fish slice).
• Leave pancake to cook on other side for about 30 seconds. For quickness, while your pancake is cooking on the other side, ladle some more batter into the pan to start on your next pancake.
• Leave pancakes to completely cool before dusting with icing sugar.
• If you have a bit of a sweet tooth, make this one-step lemon syrup to drown your pancakes in! Just heat the sugar and juice in a small saucepan until the sugar has dissolved. Do not let the syrup boil! Let it cool a bit before pouring over your pancakes!