Pancake of the month: Chai Vanilla

Happy perihelion, my friends. New year, new blog look, because somebody wants me to put bigger pictures on the site. Of course, I'm now having difficulties with pictures on my "Crazy Stuff I'm Doing" page not linking to things they used to link to -- I haven't changed the code, so I can't figure it out. If anyone can figure that out for me, I'd be grateful.

Anyway. I have decreed that it's not really January until I go back to school on Monday, which is why this is December's Pancake of the Month. I tried making chai pancakes a few years ago, using brewed chai instead of milk. Didn't really work, so I let Google suggest this recipe from Not Your Momma's Cookie. I served them with maple syrup instead of the custard sauce (note that NYMC files it under breakfast sweets!).

The result?

Very tasty; they taste nicely like chai tea, and honestly I'm pretty sure I'll like anything with cardamom. The pancakes are reasonably fluffy and quite pretty with the visible spices, but I only got 10 3/4 at 1/4 c. scoops where the recipe says 12. Adding more buttermilk would probably fix that.

On a final note, my maple syrup bottle has been growing some really beautiful sugar crystals in the bottom. At least, I hope they're sugar crystals...