The "Pannekoeken!" calls have gone silent in St. Louis Park.
The metro area's last Pannekoeken Huis (4995 Excelsior Blvd.) suddenly closed this week. Opened in 1999 as a franchise of the now-defunct Edina-based Sytje's Pannekoeken Huis Family Restaurants Inc., the restaurant built its brunch and breakfast menu and reputation around the puffy Dutch-style pancakes, which were delivered to tables with fanfare.
Owner Derek Moberg announced the closing with a sign taped to the restaurant door that read: "It is with great gratitude, and heavy hearts that we announce the closing of Pannekoeken Huis after 25 years." The note went on to say that their lease was up, but the family isn't ruling out hope that it may reopen n a different location.
The restaurant's name refers to the puffy pancake, also commonly called a Dutch baby. Whipped-up batter is poured into a hot cast-iron skillet and baked for a few minutes until the batter rises and becomes toasty golden brown along the edges. When it comes out of the oven, that center collapses into itself and the Pannekoeken Huis kitchen crew would fill the center with all kinds of breakfast delights, from bacon and savory bites to sweet pillows of fruit and whipped cream.
The thrill of the early Pannekoeken restaurants — and perhaps why the name resonates nostalgia for so many — is that the dish would then be paraded with great ceremony out of the kitchen with clanging and clamoring and shouts of "Pannekoeken!" until it finally reached the table. Breakfast just doesn't come with that kind of ceremony all that often anymore.
Fans kept hope alive on the restaurant's Facebook page, where Pannekoeken Huis boasts a beloved 4.2-star review. As passionate pancake lover Paul Bogush wrote, "Dutch babies never die!"
