Hi, A comment above has me wondering. You've said to let pancake batter sit to allow the lumps to dissolve and give the leavener a head start. I've always thought of pancake batter as being basically thin muffin batter. The ingredients seem to be about the same (more liquid in pancakes) and there's the same tendency of both a pancake and a muffin to get 'rubbery' as they cool. With muffins, it seems that over-beating and trying to get the lumps out will give you a tough muffin. I always assumed this had to do with also beating out the air pockets that form in muffin dough as soon as the liquid hits the batter and the leavener starts working. (I can actually 'see' these 'bubble holes' in muffin batter when I'm spooning it into my muffin cups.) Would that only be the case if the leavener was soda? Or baking powder? Or double-acting baking powder? Or both soda and baking powder? (My Dad's venerable 'Sunday Morning Pancakes' recipe calls for 'baking powder,' and that was Calumet back home. I THINK the can said 'double-acting' on it, but I don't remember.) I read a post on Breadtopia by a man who was a ship's captain and made sourdough pancakes for his crew every Sunday. The men would trickle into the galley over a two-hour period. Too keep his pancake batter from going flat and making tough pancakes, this man dissolved a pinch of soda in a little water in the bottom of a shot-glass. He put enough batter for one pancake into a bowl, stirred in the soda water, and then poured the batter onto the grill. It gave him light, fluffy pancakes from first to last. His batter didn't 'go flat' over the long period he was cooking the pancakes. That made sense to me... so I'm puzzled about the comment above that pancake batter benefits from sitting. Wouldn't that mean that the air bubbles from the leavening would burst every time you poured the batter, making the last pancakes rise less than the first ones? I suppose the answer lies somewhere in the chemistry of leavenings. Can you clear up this confusion? Nel, double-acting baking powder works first when it hits liquid, and second when it hits heat. So allowing it to rest, in liquid form, means the first reaction will get things going; and the second reaction won't happen till you actually pour the pancake batter onto the grill. If these were made with ONLY baking soda (which acts when it hits liquid), I wouldn't advise them sitting. As for the sourdough, that was smart - adding a little "base" (baking soda) to the acid of sourdough pancakes would definitely make them bubble up and become light. Hope this helps clear things up - PJH

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