The horror of King Arthur pancake mix

I have long loved King Arthur flour.  My baking just gets better results with it.  It doesn’t matter whether it is a quick bread, a cake, or whatever.  It just tastes better when I make it with King Arthur flour.

So naturally when I saw King Arthur pancake mix in the store, I had no hesitation to giving it a try.  And to my great surprise, I can’t say enough about how disappointing it is.

The first disappointment (yes, I have more than one) came after pouring the mix into my mixing bowl.  The mix got caught into the inner track of the plastic zipper, so I couldn’t seal it shut.  I had to get an extra plastic bag, wrap the bag of pancake mix inside that, and then zip seal the second bag shut.  That’s not a deal breaker, just an unexpected annoyance.

What is a deal breaker is the quality of pancake it produced.  You don’t need an egg, although you are free to add one.  All you really need is water.  After mixing, you’re supposed to let it set for 5 minutes before pouring onto the griddle.  The pancakes cooked up fine, but the finished product is much more like a mutated crepe than a pancake.  Pancakes should be fluffy, not spongy.  The flavor is okay, but the texture just overrides the okay flavor to provide a disappointing taste experience.

I tried different variations — using milk instead of water both with and without egg — all to no avail.  I have a mind to try using a little oil, no egg, and water.  But I’m not very hopeful.  My experience thus far has certainly been far below expectations.  I’m still sold on King Arthur flour, as I continue to experience great baking with it.  But their pancake mix?  No thanks.  I’ll pass and stick with my Krusteaz, a wonderful product from Seattle that has never disappointed me.  If it’s not broke, don’t try to fix it.

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