Dec 32 min read

Rod Serling's German Potato Pancakes

December 25, 2024 will mark the 100th anniversary of Rod Serling's birth.

Rod Serling is without a doubt one of the greatest and most influential writers in television history. He began his career in the very early days of the medium doing live broadcasts from New York. Seeking more creative freedom, he created The Twilight Zone and set his stories of powerful social commentary in the world of science fiction. The original series ran from 1959 to 1964. Over the course of his career he won six Primetime Emmy Awards for writing. His feature film credits include Seven Days in May and Planet of the Apes. He left us with a rich, generous legacy that still still hauntingly relevant today.

Recipe

This recipe is from the cookbook"It Came From the Kitchen: Monstrously Delicious Celebrity Recipes from Dracula, Frankenstein, The Wolf Man, Assorted Aliens and Beyond!" by Geoff Isaac and Gordon Reid. If you love classic horror and sci-fi, you will love this book. It is filled with quotes from filmmakers, select filmographies and plenty of fun anecdotes. I found a used copy of this book on ebay.

Ingredients

1 1/2 cups flour

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 tablespoon sugar

3 eggs

1 3/4 cups milk

2 teaspoons baking powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1 cup mashed potato

Directions

Make a well in a large bowl out of flour, salt, baking soda and baking powder. Add milk and beaten eggs and stir in mashed potatoes. Beat ingredients in bowl until the batter is very thin, with no lumps.

Cook in a skillet or large frying pan on medium heat. Brush a bit of butter on pancakes as they begin to bubble. Then turn and cook until golden brown. Remove from heat and cut pancakes into quarters or desired size, then stack pancakes on a separate plate until served. Season with pepper if so desired.

Makes: about 10 pancakes

Special Guests

Marc Scott Zicree is a TV writer / producer. His impressive list of credits includes Star Trek: The Next Generation, Deep Space Nine, Babylon 5, Sliders, Friday the 13th: The Series, He-Man, The Real Ghostbusters, The Smurfs, and many more. Released in 2006, his book The Twilight Zone Companion was a bestseller and was named in the The New York Times’ ten “Science Fiction Books for the Ages”. He recently collaborated with director Guillermo del Toro on the book Guillermo del Toro’s Cabinet of Curiosities. Zicree hosts the Youtube series Mr. Sci-Fi.

Robert N. Skir Is a writer best known for his work on Batman: The Animated Series, X-Men, and Disney's Gargoyles. He teaches The Craft Of Animation Writing at UCLA, where he earned a Master's Degree in Screenwriting. He cites Rod Serling as one of his major influences.