Breakfast Popovers

With their crisp, golden shell and soft, custard-like interior, popovers are the irresistible younger American sibling to the British Yorkshire pudding. The batter is identical, but the British version is traditionally cooked in drippings from the dinner roast, and then served alongside it with gravy as part of Sunday dinner. American popovers trend towards sweet, eaten for breakfast or alongside tea or as part of a light lunch. Today we’re making breakfast popovers, a delicious weekend treat!

Making popovers is ridiculously easy, but for “biggest” results, you’ll want to start with a smooth batter, hot oven, preheated pan, and (if you want to go the extra mile) a special popover pan. Similar to a muffin pan, a popover pan has individual baking cups, but they’re deeper and have open space around each cup for better air circulation while baking, which ultimately leads to a larger “pop.” The “pop” seems like magic, but it’s really just the result of the eggs in the batter reacting to the high heat in the oven.

The bake time is somewhat long (around 40 minutes) and you have to be patient. Opening the oven will disrupt the level of heat critical to popover success, so no peeking! Once they’re out of the oven, use a knife to make a slit in the bottom of each popover to let the steam escape. This will keep your popovers crispy!

Gently cut in half and spread with butter, these popovers (plus a large cup of coffee) were almost ready for breakfast, but not quite. I knew they needed something sweet to be perfect.

Fortunately, I was lucky enough to have on hand a jar of Raspberry and Hibiscus Flower Jam from Blake Hill Preserves in Grafton, VT. Poured by hand and packed with the bright and juicy taste of raspberries and delicate floral hibiscus flower, it was the perfect fruity topping for a buttery popover, and local to boot!

And finally, because maple season is just around the corner and everything for breakfast tastes better with a little robust Grade B, I added a swirl of pure maple syrup to take these breakfast popovers over the top. Beautiful breakfast popover perfection!

Are you a fan of breakfast popovers? This post was first published in 2014 and has been updated. 

GET THE RECIPE: Easy Popovers Recipe