My customer is my 2 yr. old daughter D. She wants pancakes and what I want is for her to eat them.
Making pankcake shapes was a huge pain.
My cousins Tom and Amy gave us a set of holiday pancake molds for a gift one year.
The first time I used them it was a huge mess. The pancakes stuck to the molds and I had headless ghosts, wingless bats and a pumpkin missing a lower jaw.
I tried again and finally got a bat that looked like a bat and my daughter went nuts over it.
Understanding the stated and unstated needs of your customer.
When breakfast was done it was decided that ghosts taste better then bats but not as good as pumpkins.
More importantly she ate everything on her plate.
Dilemma: Go back to making pancakes that she didn't eat or improve the process to make holiday pancakes she will eat?
I'm a lean guy so of couse I improved the process to meet my customers needs.
After a couple more tries I was able to troubleshoot why the batter was sticking to the molds and set up a process that was simple to do and produced perfect pancakes every time.
- Set the heat to 4.5 and heat pan
- Spray the mold with Pam
- Put the mold in the pan and fill 1/3 way with batter
- After a minute trace the mold with a toothpick to seperate it from the pancake
- Lift off mold (no longer needed) and then flip pancake
- Cook and serve!!
The only significant amount of added time is the cleaning of the pancake molds which is well worth the extra time. The dishwasher takes care of that part...(which has already been leaned in my house)
More important was that instead of trying to convince my customer that she wanted regular pancakes I spent my time changing my process to exceed her expectations and with little extra effort on my part.
Breakfast is now fun for all of us. D. looks forward to Saturday pancakes where she can eat her spooky breakfast. Of course everyone needs a "butter bath" before they are eaten but isn't that expected?
