Vegan Pumpkin Spice Pancakes

Happy Halloween, folks!

I realize I am so unbelievably late on this recipe. Ever since pumpkin spice season started, I have been desperately craving these fall-inspired pancakes. Already a huge fan of breakfast food and everything pumpkin spice, I dreamed about making a tall stack of fluffy orange pancakes, covered in maple syrup and sprinkled with cinnamon. Little did I know how time-consuming/frustrating this venture would actually end being. 

Originally, I started out with the idea of creating a vegan AND gluten-free pancake recipe. I admit that this is incredibly hard to do since your ingredient list is limited. Usually a gluten-free flour like coconut or almond flour requires egg to keep everything together. Since this vegan recipe omits eggs, I tried to substitute with coconut oil and pumpkin puree. Unfortunately, this was not enough to hold the batter together, and I ended up with a tasty – but sloppy – mess that literally just fell apart on the pan. My sad excuse for a pancake wouldn’t hold together, nor cook thoroughly. Though it still tasted amazing (the pumpkin spice aromas were fabulous), it just looked awful and the texture was anything but a pancake.

After this failed attempt, I was pretty disappointed, and left my kitchen for what felt like a long time. However, my hunger for pumpkin spice pancakes did not vanish, and I soon returned to the kitchen, more eager than ever. I had recently carved a baby sugar pumpkin, and saved its innards for the smallest batch of pumpkin puree. I was ready. With the same recipe I had originally created on that sad, sad day, I picked up  right where I left off, with just one minor change. Instead of using that dreaded almond flour again, I decided to use a nutri-flour blend of white flour and oat hull fibre. This combination worked perfectly, and the high-fibre content made me feel a bit better about eating pancakes for dinner. I would have liked these pancakes to be more pumpkin-y, but my sugar pie pumpkin was so tiny I barely got 1/2 cup of puree from it. As a result, this recipe will call for more pumpkin puree, so you can get that full pumpkin experience. 

I am sorry, my gluten-free vegan friends – I tried. In the future, I will search for other egg replacers and come up with something that works. Feel free to reach out to me in the comments if you know of any vegan egg replacers to use with gluten-free flours. In the meantime, here are some fluffy (non g/f) vegan pumpkin spice pancakes that actually look AND taste spectacular! Enjoy these bad boys alongside a vegan pumpkin spice latte if you’re feeling a little extra this morning. 😉 

Vegan Pumpkin Spice Pancakes

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Serves: 2 Prep Time: 5 minutes Cooking Time: 20 Minutes

Ingredients

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour (I used this kind)
1 cup unsweetened almond milk
2 tbsp. coconut oil
1 tbsp. baking powder
1 pinch of salt
1 tsp. pure vanilla extract
2 tsp. pumpkin pie spice (store-bought or make your own here)
3 tbsp. organic brown sugar or pure maple syrup
2/3 cup pumpkin puree
1/4 cup of pecans, chopped (optional)
1 pinch of cinnamon, to top (optional)
1 banana, sliced, to top (optional)

Vegan Pumpkin Spice Pancakes was last modified: November 3rd, 2017 by themindfulstrawberry

Instructions

1. In a large bowl, mix together dry ingredients first (flour, brown sugar, baking powder, salt, spices). Be sure to mix thoroughly before adding in the wet ingredients.
2. Create an empty circle in the middle of the bowl, and add in oil, almond milk, pumpkin puree, and vanilla extract.
3. Fold ingredients together and lightly mix with a spatula (be sure not to overmix).
4. Let batter rise for 5 minutes (this procedure allows baking powder to work its magic and is what makes vegan pancakes fluffy).
5. Preheat a large frying pan over medium heat and add some coconut oil to it for cooking.
6. Once pan is heated, lower heat to medium-low and add 1/3 cup of batter to pan.
7. Let batter cook undisturbed for a few minutes or until you see bubbles bursting on the edges.
8. Flip pancake gently and cook until lightly browned.
9. Repeat this process until all pancakes are cooked. This recipe makes 7-8 pancakes depending on size.
10. Top with maple syrup, pecans, sliced bananas and cinnamon (optional).

Vegan Pumpkin Spice Pancakes was last modified: November 3rd, 2017 by themindfulstrawberry