In defense of spinach pancakes: A recipe worth loving, unless you're an Internet troll
Back in March, Chelsea Clinton set the internet on fire when she tweeted a photo of spinach pancakes she made for her family for National Pancake Day. The fury was swift and funny: “Looks like the residue after the swamp is drained” might have been my favorite retweet.
Clinton defended the choice as a way to get her daughter (who loves the pancakes) to consume more iron, and others praised her. (“If you can get a small child to eat spinach by making spinach pancakes, you are a genius,” one tweeted.)
I was of two minds: First, it might not surprise you to learn that I find nothing inherently horrifying about spinach in pancakes, any more than I would about greens in smoothies. Depends on the recipe, right? On the other hand, no offense, but Clinton's pancakes did look pretty awful: a twisted green pile rather than a neat snack with toppings. I immediately tweeted her a green pancake recipe from The Post's archives that had a little — make that a lot — more eye appeal.
A few months later, when I saw a recipe for Green Pancakes in a new cookbook, I thought I'd dive in a little further. Unlike Clinton's, which she said use steamed and pureed spinach, these call for raw spinach, which you puree with egg yolks, milk and — this is the brilliant addition — a handful of fresh mint leaves. The mint (along with a little sugar) make these taste bright and fresh.
The recipe is from Portland, Oregon, chef Jenn Louis's lovely collection, “The Book of Greens” (Ten Speed Press, 2017). She uses all-purpose flour, but I substituted white whole-wheat flour for an extra dose of whole-grain goodness, and for a little more texture, I added pumpkin seeds to her suggested toppings of soft goat cheese and/or strawberry preserves. The result has kid appeal, for sure, but any greens-loving adult would scarf these up, too. I did.
I am tempted to ask the internet trolls to not knock it till they try it, but since when did that do any good?