Bisquick Warning

[julienc]

Hey Everyone,

Normally I use Jiffy mix for making pancakes, but about a year ago we switched to Bisquick for something different. (The "safe" Bisquick, which is their original mix that uses milk.) All was well, but then I was eating my pancakes this weekend and thought they tasted sweet. Sure enough, this box I recently purchased has sugar listed as one of the ingredients. We were really careful when switching over from Jiffy, so I know this is a new change. The box looks exactly the same as before.

Just wanted to warn you all in case you use Bisquick. Back to Jiffy for us.

[ukbill]

Pancakes are flour, milk and eggs..and a 2 min whisk.. why buy an expensive packet that will have loads of additives and preservatives when they are so very easy to knock together?

[kim55]

We use the Kroger baking mix, which is cheaper than Bisquick and has so far been safe.

Some pancakes, known in the US as Dutch babies, use only flour, milk, eggs, butter, and sometimes a little salt.

Bisquick pancakes contain a few more ingredients. When I was in school many years ago, we learned a recipe that you could substitute for Bisquick called Missouri Mix. I am sure they taught it under different names in other parts of the US. I no longer have the recipe, but I just found a version of it on the web. The link is:

extension.missouri.edu/publications/DisplayPub.aspx?P=GH1055

I had also posted the recipe here but I have been asked to move it to the Recipes thread, so I have.

[colormist]

Ugh, Julie. I noticed my recent new box of Bisquick (pancake mix) tasted sweet. I checked the label and I thought for sure it only listed dextrose (but honestly, they taste way worse--even my husband doesn't like them). We haven't had waffles since our first batch. Now I'll have to check the label again. We normally buy Jiffy (the plant is located just a few miles from my house).

[kim55]

Julie, I forgot to say thanks for the warning.

Some time back my husband decided to switch to the low-fat baking mix without telling me. One bite of my pancakes (which he had been nice enough to make) and I had to say "I can't eat these." He insisted that he had just used the same ingredients we always used until I pointed out that the low-fat version had done what they always do: made up for the lack of fat flavor by adding sugar. We switched back to the regular stuff. Now I'm sorry to see the regular brand going in the same direction.

We buy the store brand because it's cheaper (and somehow Jiffy never tasted right to me) but I'll have to watch out to make sure they don't make the same change.

[julienc]

Kim - thanks for the recipe on the Missouri Mix. I may try to make up a bunch of that ahead of time.

[charlie]

Bill, you took the words right out of my mouth!!!
by the time you have opened the packet, added the liquid you may just as well make them from scratch. except that american pancakes are usually thicker than our english ones, the traditional american ones are harder to make.

I make up a batch with 300ml milk, one egg and 4oz plain flour, whisk it up with an electric whisk then put it in a beaker. it then stores for several days in the fridge and can be shaken up and used as needed. these make our thin ones. The traditional american ones need a bit more work.

[julienc]

Charlie, you must be right in stating that British pancakes are different than American! (And I should clarify that I make waffles more frequently than pancakes.) As Kim's recipe indicates, the American version needs some type of leavening agent, salt, and shortening. While it may seem easy, I don't have time to do all that on the fly when I have a hungry toddler in tow. I need to dump in the mix, stir in the wet ingredients, and away I go (w/out exact measuring).

Kim's solution of making up a big batch of the exact dry ingredients would work well.

Thanks!

[colormist]

Waffles > Pancakes.

Although I am curious as to whether or not Bill's pancake recipe would work in a belgium waffle iron. What's your experience with waffles, Bill? I just bought mine so I don't want to ruin it by using unsuitable ingredients. Mine came with a recipe for waffle mix, but they all have sugar in them (OF COURSE THEY DO).

[charlie]

If Bills recipe is like mine then it would make an almighty mess!!!!!

I bought a pancake maker - well, actually its a glorified frying pan and it came with the american recipe, I will have a rummage and see if I still have the booklet it came with

[ukbill]

Never tried to make waffles they look good but always smell terrible!

I eat potato waffles occasionally but they are always quite oily or even greasy..

Waffles are totally different from pancakes.

Although I would imagine just making the batter much thicker might do the trick. I will have to see if I can get a waffle iron or maker and try..

In the UK we have pancakes which are the same as the French Crapes (which have a fancy roof thing over the letter 'a' but otherwise are identical)

The French make a BIG thing out of their Crapes and in expensive restaurants cook them at the table so you get to eat them nice and hot.

I eat my pancakes with milk and lemon Juice.. mmm nice! I occasionally have them instead of a sweet course if I'm doing a dinner party.

If I was doing something fancy for another HFI person I would put them on the plate rolled up with whipped cream a 1/4 of lemon and a sprig of mint in the whipped cream for decoration.

For the "Normals" at the meal they have their pancakes with ice cream and red berry's.

No one notices the batter mix has no sugar as they tend to sprinkle a little caster sugar on them anyway.

For pancake day we have them with milk and Lemon.. the rest of my family sprinkle caster sugar on theirs.. well they do now, not sure after they have watched Dr Lustigs video though

[ukbill]

I think American pancakes are just larger versions of our "Scotch Pancakes" which are about 8mm thick 4/10th inch.

I have made these before with and without sugar they are as easy to make as normal pancakes just make them thick and add bicarb of soda I think.. I'll look it up and edit if needed.

[kim55]

We have waffles at least twice a month for Sunday breakfast.

When we make "regular" waffles (not Belgian), we simply follow the Bisquick recipe, which uses 1 egg per 2 cups dry ingredients, and also uses 2 Tablespoons of oil. We also use a well-seasoned waffle iron.

We don't make Belgian waffles nearly as often. They are deeper and the holes are larger, and take a different waffle iron. The mix that we use is Carbon's Golden Malted Pancake and Waffle mix. I just checked the one in my pantry, though, and it has sugar listed in the ingredients, pretty far down but it is there. I don't know if it always had it and I just didn't detect it, or if it is a recent change. Anyway, the ingredient that Carbon's has that the other mixes don't have is barley malt. I think it makes the waffles puff up higher. I tried to buy pure barley malt to experiment with but there are two kinds and I bought the wrong one. It is expensive enough that I didn't go any farther with the experiment.

I have seen some recipes for Belgian waffles that involved beating the egg whites until they are stiff and then folding in the rest of the ingredients. I haven't ever tried it, though.

[Tammy]

We have waffles or pancakes every week. I just use the Bisquick (so far mine is safe and so are the ones on the store shelf) or Jiffy Mix and just make the batter thicker for waffles. I've never had a problem with the maker.
I'd just leave the sugar out of the recipe. It's probably not enough to make a difference.

[meaniejean]

We make waffles all the time. We just use the recipe that came with the waffle iron and use dextrose in place of the sugar. We make a double batch and freeze the extras between wax paper in a plastic freezer bag. We throw them in the toaster oven for a great quick breakfast.

[meaniejean]

We make pancakes regularly as well:

1 c. flour
1 c. milk (we use skim)
1 TBSP dextrose
2 tsp. baking powder
2 TBSP canola oil
1 egg

Mix all together and pour by 1/4 cup onto hot, greased griddle.
I'm hungry.

[hfimomof3]

Wow, that is a bummer about Bisquik. we use it a lot. I also noticed that Barilla increased the sugar content of their pasta from 1g per servign to 2g per serving, making it inedible for me. I was really sad about that.

[kim55]

I don't buy Barilla pasta because the store brand is cheaper, but I never realized it had sugar in it. Why would anyone need to put sugar in pasta?

[kim55]

OK, I just checked the pasta in my pantry. The Kroger brand that I buy also states it has 2g per one cup (56g) serving. And I did have some Barilla "Whole Grain" that states it is made with 51% whole wheat (bought before I joined this board and realized whole wheat could be a problem), which states it has 2g per serving. However, none of the ingredients in either one appear to have added sugar, so it must be the sugar naturally present in the wheat. Is it possible that they haven't changed the recipe, but have just done more accurate testing? Or have they changed the serving size? I've never had a problem with pasta, but I'm not as sensitive as some people.

[ukbill]

IT could well be the testing.

Detecting a few specific molecules in a a soup of millions of nearly identical molecules is very difficult and prone to errors induced by testing procedures, service interval of testing equipment etc.. let alone the variances in age and moisture content of tested sample and genetic variety of sample and so on.. its a mine field.

Any Laboratory that says they can reliably detect low % of one carbohydrate (for example sugar) in a rich carbohydrate (starch) item (such as a potato) is putting enthusiasm and marketing ahead of scientific principle.

The reason whole grain can be a problem is the "Germ" of the grain contains a little Fructose, a "whole Grain" will also include the bran fibre which is digestible and so will convert to Sucrose in the intestine causing inflammation in the gut. (IBS)

So "Healthy" whole grains are anything but "Healthy" for those of us with HFI.

IF the list of ingredients do not list sugar there should not be any added.. however "Natural Flavouring" can contain Fructose in its pure form or sugar..

"Natural Flavouring" are words that can cover a lot of sin for the manufactures!