waking up productive - making virtuous pancakes

On September weekends I'm waking with the sun, marveling at the thick fog that envelops our tiny riverside town so early, and tucking cold toes into fleece-lined slippers to patter around the kitchen. Autumn is early this year - like a surprise party you began to suspect, but wouldn't let yourself believe until you saw a driveway full of familiar cars (sidewalks peppered with acorns, leaves already beginning to fall!).
With the morning chill comes vigor - waking up productive - and a hunger for something of substance, something virtuous.
Heidi's Wild Rice Flour Pancakes (with twists)
(from Heidi Swanson's Super Natural Cooking)

Ingredients:

1 cup white whole wheat flour
1/2 cup all purpose flour
1/2 cup wild rice flour (or roughly 2 heaping tablespoons wild rice blend ground to a powder in a spice grinder)
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/3 cup organic cane sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons melted butter
1/2 cup (heaping) applesauce (to make your own, peel, core and chop 1 large apple and cook it down to a mush with 2 tablespoons water and a scant tablespoon of sugar)
2 1/4 cups buttermilk (I used a buttermilk powder made for baking (5 tablespoons) along with approximately 2 cups of water instead of the buttermilk)
1 cup cooked wild rice
butter or oil for frying, if desired (I use a non-stick skillet and find I don't need any butter or oil)

Combine the flours, baking powder, baking soda, sugar, and salt in a large bowl. To the flour mixture, add the melted butter, applesauce, and enough buttermilk to make the batter (use more buttermilk if you prefer thinner pancakes, less if you prefer thicker) - mix only until just combined.
Heat a skillet or griddle over medium high heat. Pour 1/3 cup of the batter onto the hot skillet and sprinkle a tablespoon of the wild rice over the top. Wait until the edges begin to look dry and the batter is bubbling, then flip and cook just another minute or two, until golden. Repeat with the remaining batter and rice - you should have about a dozen pancakes with this recipe.

Serve hot with the usual accompaniments, or do as I did and eat them plain right of the plate with your fingers - they are that good.

*As the summer wanes and fall is upon us, it's time to make the most of what's left of the late summer crop - next up is the Grown in Frederick eggplant challenge!*