Pataniscas

The canteen at work does some really nice food. It also, unfortunately, makes some really awful food too, but that is perhaps a story for another day. One of the really delicious things that comes out of the kitchens about once a fortnight are Pataniscas de Legumes. I feel it only fair at this juncture to point out that these are a vegetarian version of a traditional Portuguese recipe, Pataniscas de Bacalhau, that is, Pataniscas of Salt Cod. Of course, being a veggie myself I have not tried the original recipe, but the veggie version from my work's canteen has become a favourite of mine.

Pataniscas de Legumes, English Style!

Sorry. Maybe I ought to explain exactly what a Patanisca is? Simply put it's a pancake. Yesterday I eventually got around to trying to make some myself. Last week I found a recipe online, used Google to translate it into English (just to be sure!) and had, on my last trip to the supermercado bought all the required ingredients, namely a load of veggies, some eggs and the all important but not usually on my shopping list; fizzy water for the batter. And so, after work, I set to, with the recipe close at hand, making Pataniscas. I finely chopped the onion and pepper, grated the carrot and courgette, put in a little garlic and mixed them all together. Then I made the batter, a cup of flour, an egg, some salt, spices and a cup of the especially bought fizzy water. Mix it all together, gas on, skillet out and off we go...

Now then. The ones I eat at work are, as I have already said, completely and absolutely delicious. They are light and fluffy, with an almost cake-like texture to them; moist and tasty. There was this one time when they put way too much garlic in but usually they are simply gorgeous. Mine were nice, but not the same as the ones from the work's canteen kitchen. Firstly I think I had my vegetable to batter ratio all wrong. I have since done a little more exploring on the web and found some pictures of the mixture before it is fried, and my suspicions seem to be confirmed by these photographs. Secondly I think I had my batter too liquid. In fact, in doing my second round of research it seems apparent that most of the recipes do not use the fizzy water in the batter at all, but go for a more standard pancake batter of flour, milk and eggs.

I'll let you know how the revised attempt goes. I'm sure I can do a much better job next time!