Keep your expandable leggings on and, for goddesses sake, keep eating! Make these healthful holiday pancakes stat. Pancakes aren’t known for their complex flavor, but this recipe is an exception.
Serves: 8
Time to Prepare: 30 minutes (15-20 minutes with a large griddle)
Ingredients
- 1 cup of wheat berries
- ¾ cup of whole wheat pastry flour
- ½ tsp. of salt
- 1 tbsp. of baking powder
- 1 tsp. of baking soda
- 1 tsp. of pumpkin pie spice
- 1 serving of EnerG Egg Replacer
- 2 cups of almond milk
- ½-1 cup of water
- 3 tbsp. of walnut oil
- ½ cup of pureed pumpkin
- Oil for the griddle
- Options: Dried fruit, sliced bananas, pecans, toasted walnuts, maple syrup, sweet agave nectar
Instructions
In a blender, food processor, or mill, grind the wheat berries on a high speed until they become flour-like (they will still feel grainy, but should be ground to a coarse powder). Combine the wheat berry flour with the whole wheat pastry flour, salt, baking powder, baking soda, and pumpkin pie spice, setting the mix aside. Whip up the EnerG Egg Replacer according to the instructions. Add to the Egg Replacer the almond milk, ½ cup of water, and almond oil. Combine these together thoroughly. Mix the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients, creating a batter. Mix the pureed pumpkin into the batter. Add more water, if needed, to create a batter that easily pours out of its container. Lightly oil a griddle or sauté pan. Turn the heat to medium and allow the pan to fully heat. Pour about ½ cup of batter onto the pan and quickly rotate the pan to get as disk-like a shape as possible with the batter. Cook the bottom for about 3 minutes and flip the pancake. Cook the other side for about 2 minutes. Remove this from the pan and set it aside. Repeat this process until you are out of batter. Options: Top the pancakes with any of the optional ingredients.
Low-fat Version
These can be cooked on a dry, non-stick griddle over a medium heat. Make sure that you completely loosen the pancake before flipping it since there will be no oil to create a slick barrier between the pancake and the
griddle. You can omit the oil in the pancake batter and replace it with soy creamer.
Raw Version
Use sprouted wheat berries (soak them for eight hours and then sprout them in a sprouting jar; they should be ready after a day). Grind the sprouted wheat berries. Substitute almond flour for the whole wheat
pastry flour. Combine the spices and salt with the almond flour. Mix this into the ground wheat berry mix. Add just enough water or coconut water to make a stiff dough. Spread the dough into pancake shapes on a dehydrator sheet and dehydrate them for about three hours, flip them, and then continue dehydrating them for another two hours. Serve with pecans. Omit any ingredients not listed in this section.
Complementary Food and Drinks
Serve this with semi-sweet, cinnamon spiced coffee.
Where to Shop
Wheat berries, as well as the Egg Replacer and soy creamer, can be found at Sprouts, Whole Foods, Central Market, and most health food stores. The rest of the ingredients should be available at your local market. Approximate cost per serving is $1. And they say veganism is expensive. Ha.
How It Works
The baking powder activates when it is mixed with liquid, causing the two compounds in it to combine and release tiny amounts of gas. This keeps the pancakes light. The baking soda keeps them cake-like, which is
necessary because of the pureed pumpkin. Soy creamer is used for flavor and the oil in the batter makes the pancakes tender. Wheat berries are used for their incredible flavor. Whole wheat pastry flour is used to smooth out the pancakes, which would be too crunchy with just the wheat berry flour (you can exchange the pastry flour for more wheat berry flour if you have a very powerful blender like a VitaMix).
Recipe via Chef Jason Wyrick, the executive Chef & publisher of the world’s only vegan culinary magazine, The Vegan Culinary Experience.