Maple Mayhem Week: Your Favorite Maple Recipes

As we all know, Maple Mayhem is released this week. We love the maple recipes Jessie includes in her books, and being New Englanders, we have a few of our own to share:

Julie: Brussel Sprouts, Bacon, and Maple Syrup. I’ll just let that sit for a bit. I first saw this recipe on Boston.com, and have tweaked it a bit over the years.

2 pounds Brussels sprouts, trimmed and halved

2 tablespoons olive oil

3 tablespoons maple syrup

5 slices of bacon, cut into 1/2-inch pieces

Salt and pepper, to taste

1. Set oven at 400 degrees. Have on hand a large rimmed baking sheet.

2. In a bowl, toss the Brussels sprouts with olive oil, maple syrup, bacon, salt, and pepper. Spread the mixture in a single layer on the baking sheet.

3. Roast for 25 to 30 minutes, turning several times, or until the Brussels sprouts are tender and caramelized and the bacon is crisp and golden. This can take up to 40 minutes.

You can also add carrots or parsnips to the mix.

Edith: Geez. I don’t use maple syrup anywhere except on top of pancakes and French toast. So here’s my favorite pancake recipe, that I got from a certain Country Store Mysteries series.

Whole Wheat Banana Walnut Pancakes

Ingredients:

2 c whole wheat flour

1 T baking powder

1 t salt

1 T brown sugar

3 eggs

2 c milk or buttermilk (of any fat content)

¼ c oil

½ c finely chopped walnuts

2 bananas, thinly sliced

Butter for cooking

Greener Pastures maple syrup

Plain or vanilla yogurt, or sour cream.

Directions:

1. Preheat a wide skillet or griddle to medium.

2. Mix the dry ingredients together.

3. Beat the eggs, then add the milk and oil.

4. Stir in the dry ingredients and beat until smooth.

5. Fold in the walnuts and bananas.

6. Melt one T of butter in the pan and spread it evenly.

7. Form pancakes of the size you like and cook until bubbles form and pop.

8. Flip the cakes and cook until done.

9. Serve with warm syrup and top with butter, yogurt, or sour cream.

Barb: Did you ever have one of those situations where you are asked for something and you’re like–”Oh my gosh, I have exactly the thing right here!” Well that just happened to me. I needed a recipe with maple syrup and there’s one in Musseled Out, the third Maine Clambake Mystery, which I have just turned in to my editor. It’s a fall book, and the recipe is for Grandma Snowden’s Pumpkin Whoopie Pies. Whoopie pies are the State Snack of Maine, where they were invented. (Unless you believe some crazy people from Pennsylvania.) So it’s Sugar Grove meets Busman’s Harbor. I smell cross-over. The recipe is long, so I put it on a separate page, with a link here.

Jessie: One of my favorite maple recipes is one that is perfect for those last minute calls you get to contribute something to a bake sale. It is quick, easy and gets rave reviews.

Maple Blondies

1 stick or 1/2 cup of butter

¾ cup light brown sugar

¼ cup pure maple syrup

1 large egg

½ teaspoon maple extract

1 cup all purpose flour

¼ teaspoon nutmeg

a pinch of salt

Preheat the oven to 350 F. Spray a 8 x 8 baking dish with non-stick cooking spray.

In a saucepan heat the butter and brown sugar over low heat until the butter is melted and the sugar is dissolved. Remove from heat and stir in the maple syrup, egg, and maple extract. In a separate bowl whisk together the flour, nutmeg and salt. Add the dry ingredients to the contents of the saucepan. Whisk together until smooth. Pour into prepared baking dish and bake for 22-28 minutes.

These are meant to be soft, even a bit undercooked by most baking standards. If this is not to your liking, increase the baking time by three-minute intervals until a desired degree of firmness is achieved.

Sherry: I confess I don’t have a lot of recipes that use maple syrup. I, like Edith, usually use it on pancakes or French toast. However, I did hit on something really simple. Even  been trying to eat less carbs and The South Beach Diet has dessert recipes that call for ricotta cheese and things like mini chocolate chips, vanilla or lemon zest. I’m sure you can see where this is going. One night we didn’t have any of those things but we did have maple syrup so we tried a half cup of ricotta with a drizzle of maple syrup. It’s delicious.

Readers: Any favorite maple syrup recipes?

Filed under: Recipes Tagged: Banana-walnut pancakes, Country Store Mysteries, Maine Clambake Mystery, maple blondies, Maple Mayhem, musseled out, pumpkin whoopie pies, Sugar Grove Mysteries