Buttermilk Pancakes

Buttermilk pancakes: Easy, quick, and delicious. No special tools required, only basic ingredients needed. Ready in 25 minutes. Serve with butter and real maple syrup. Enjoy café-worthy food in your own home for a lazy Sunday.

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• ❓Why should you make these buttermilk pancakes?
• 🥘 Ingredients
• 🔪 Instructions
• 📖 Recipe
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❓Why should you make these buttermilk pancakes?

• they're light, tender and fluffy.
• no special equipment is needed. All you need is a hand whisk, two bowls and a pan.
• only basic ingredients. And there’s some flex with your dairy ingredients if you’re improvising (explained below).
• no need to separate eggs.
• no need to rest the batter.
• takes around 25 minutes to make enough pancakes to feed 2-3 people.

I swear my kids love me a bit more when I make these on a Sunday morning. And they’re so easy – I should make the ‘effort’ more often! For a long time, I would prefer to make lemon and sugar crepes instead because I thought they were easier. They are easy, but these buttermilk pancakes are even easier. I needed to develop the right recipe 😊 No need to worry about lumps in buttermilk pancakes; so need need to mix carefully. There’s no need to rest the batter. We better preserve the air-producing effects of the raising agents without this step.

Serve with softened salted butter and maple syrup. Together they create a rich, buttery and sweet sauce (obviously!). This not only tastes delicious but also helps the maple syrup go a bit further. Maple syrup’s expensive (and pancakes drink it up!). There’s no substitute for the real stuff though. Please make sure you buy pure maple syrup and not maple syrup-flavoured.

You don’t have to use blueberries. Unadulterated pancakes are wonderful too. Or you can substitute with other fresh fruits. Small chunks of banana work well. I once tried chocolate chips and even the kids didn’t like that. Not sure why. You don’t often see chocolate chip buttermilk pancakes, and for good reason! Let me know if I’m missing something!

What? No need to separate eggs?

Many buttermilk pancake recipes call for separating eggs. They recommend whisking whites to fold through the rest of the batter ingredients. This makes sense to incorporate air for light, fluffy pancakes. I tried separating eggs and whisking the whites many times and hated so much about it. I would steer my kids towards the said crepes because they seemed like the easier option. Who wants to be whisking egg whites on a Sunday morning? Whisking egg whites means getting out the electric whisk because I'm too lazy to do by hand. The noise is the last thing anyone needs first thing, even if the pancakes are very delicious!

I found a recipe which – revelation- claimed that you didn’t need to whisk the egg white. You did still need to separate the eggs. The yolks and whites were added in different stages. So much better! The pancakes were as light and fluffy as the ones with the whisked whites. I thought this was as easy as buttermilk pancakes were going to get. My ‘controversial’ technique of using whole eggs was a happy accident. I did it by mistake when I wasn’t following the recipe properly. And guess what? They still worked as well. These buttermilk pancakes are light, tender and fluffy. And very easy to pull together. Give it a go!

Pantry Ingredients

You no doubt already have what you need for these flexible pancakes. I’ve suggested a combination of buttermilk and Greek yoghurt here. The goal is to have tasty pancakes (!), but also some acid in the wet ingredients. These react with the raising agents in the dry mix to get bubbles. Bubbles = fluffy pancakes, which everyone loves. Other acidified milk products will work fine. Think plain yoghurt, sour cream, or cream cheese. You can use a touch of regular milk to thin them down if need be. Thicker batter is key for tall, fluffy pancakes. Think ‘dollop-able’ rather than pourable. Adapt to your fridge stash – there’s no excuse not to make these.

🥘 Ingredients

Greek Yoghurt – why Greek yoghurt? It’s thicker than other yoghurts. It’s a similar consistency to sour cream, which means sour cream is a good substitute. They both share a similar appearance, texture and flavour – a bit tangy. Use the full fat versions for the best results.

Buttermilk – this looks like a gloopy milk, somewhere between milk and yoghurt. It was traditionally made as a byproduct of churning butter. Buttermilk is now usually made by adding lactic acid to low-fat milk. It has a slightly tangy and sour flavour and is a bit acidic. It works with the baking soda in this recipe to create bubbles. This gives us light and fluffy pancakes.

Can I make my own buttermilk?

Yes! You need milk and lemon juice. To make the 170g of buttermilk used in this recipe, combine 170g of milk with 1 teaspoon of lemon juice. Stir well and let it sit for about 5-10 minutes. The acid in the lemon juice will curdle the milk, creating a buttermilk substitute.

Sugar – there’s a small amount in the batter. Most of the sweetness comes from the maple syrup poured over to serve (up to you how much!).

Fresh Blueberries (optional) – you don’t need many. I’ve found that 3 blueberries per pancake, pushed into the top before flipping is perfect. I only add the blueberries if they’re in season. This way they’re good, readily available and well-priced. I love frozen blueberries all year round (great in blueberry muffins!), but they don’t work well in pancakes. The batter around them gets too cold and won’t cook properly. If you defrost them, they’ll be mushy and messy to work with.

Butter – I use unsalted butter in the batter and salted to serve. Skip the extra salt in the batter if you only have salted butter. I love putting blobs of butter on top of each pancake to serve (between them in a stack).

Egg – adds appealing colour and flavour to the pancakes. It also helps the pancakes to rise.

Baking Soda & Baking Powder – these are both leavening (raising) agents. Baking soda is also called bicarbonate of soda. It works with acids like buttermilk to create gas. This reaction happens as soon as you combine them but is also activated further on heating.

Plain/All-Purpose Flour – the classic choice for pancakes. You can try experimenting with other flours. Perhaps the same amount of whole wheat flour for heartier, nuttier pancakes? Or gluten-free if that’s what your diet requires.

🔪 Instructions

Make the batter

This is a doddle. Combine the dry ingredients – flour, baking powder and soda, salt and sugar – in one bowl. Combine the wet ingredients – melted butter, buttermilk, egg and yoghurt in another. Now, when you’re ready to go ahead and make the pancakes, get your pan preheating over a medium heat (no oil required). Tip the wet ingredients over the dry and combine with a gentle touch. We want to make sure there’s no dry powdery stuff in sight, but not pop all our big air bubbles that are already forming. We don’t mind lumpy batter at all here.

We want to use the batter straight away. This is when the raising agents are freshly activated and will give the most lift. Keen to get ahead? You can save yourself 5 minutes in the morning by preparing the wet and dry ingredients in advance. Keep them separate until ready to cook. This is how boxed pancake mixes work.

Make the pancakes

What type of pan do I need?

I use a crepe pan for buttermilk pancakes. It’s 24cm diameter and is non-stick. It has short sides, which makes getting under the pancakes to flip them easy. Whatever you use, make sure it’s non-stick. You don't need butter or oil in the pan. They cause uneven colouring of the pancakes and the butter burns.

How big should I make the pancakes?

I recommend making smaller pancakes, about 8cm across, or ¼-cup worth of batter. This makes for easier flipping and taller stacks. You could, of course, make them any size you like. The cooking time may change a bit, but you’ll still be looking for the same visual clues in any case. These are more important than the time, which will depend on your pan, heat source and size of pancakes.

‘Goldilocks’ Temperature

I’ve found that the trick to success is having the heat high enough. You want to cook the pancakes in 2-3 minutes each side without burning the outside. Not ripping hot, but medium heat. Adjust the heat if need be. When cooked, the sides of the pancake need to look dry. Shiny uncooked batter indicates an uncooked interior. High heat gives you fluffy pancakes by creating air bubbles. These help the pancake to cook faster. This seems counter-intuitive. You might think that lower heat over a longer period will help cook the pancakes all the way through. Trust me. Cooking well on the stove eliminates the need to finish cooking in the oven. Some other recipes recommend this.

Dollop batter into the pan. If you’re using a ¼ cup (or something else) to measure it out, don’t pack the batter down or level the top. We want to preserve the loose structure of the batter. You can run a mini spatula or teaspoon around the edge to tip out into the pan. With a light touch, smooth the tops for an even thickness, about a centimetre thick. Keep the heat on medium.

In about two minutes, you’ll notice air bubbles popping in the centre of the pancakes. This is your cue to press in a few blueberries if you’re using and flip the pancakes gently. We don’t want to pop our bubbles. An offset spatula is handy for this. Now, the batter will still be a bit loose and the fip will be a bit messy on the sides. Press any messy sides back in with the offset spatula before they cook all the way through.

Cook for another 2 minutes or so, until the sides no longer look wet and shiny, but matte and cooked through. If one side is cooking faster than the other, you can spin the pancake around to maximise hot spots in your pan. If the sides are still shiny, the inside won’t be cooked through. Wipe the spatula clean with paper towel between flips so that you don’t transfer wet batter onto cooked. Don’t be afraid to flip the pancakes again if it is browning too fast on one side and the sides aren’t cooked through yet.

Lay the pancakes on a wire rack so that the outsides stay crisp while you finish making the batch. You can put the rack in a low oven if you’re worried they’re going to get cold. I find that this is not necessary for this amount of pancakes.

Serve with salted butter and maple syrup. Enjoy!

📖 Recipe

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