Pumpkin Pie Pancakes

I love these pancakes! They are pretty healthy, but you would never know it! You could use all whole wheat flour if you want and they would still be great.

1 C. unbleached all purpose flour
1 C. whole wheat flour
1 T. baking powder
2 eggs
1 C. canned pumpkin
2 C. buttermilk
1/2 C. plain fat free yogurt
2 T. butter, melted (optional)
4 T. sugar
1/4 t. ground ginger
1/4 t. cinnamon
1/4 t. nutmeg
3/4 t. pumpkin pie spice

In a small bowl, combine the white flour, whole wheat flour and baking powder. Set aside. in a medium bowl, combine eggs, pumpkin, buttermilk, yogurt, butter, sugar and spices. Add flour mixture to pumpkin mixture and stir until thoroughly combined. Heat a nonstick griddle over low heat with a bit of vegetable spray. Spoon heaping tablespoons of batter onto the griddle and cook. Serve with Cinnamon Vanilla syrup or dusted with powdered sugar.

Cinnamon-Apple Pancakes

I wasn't really a pancake lover until I had these!

Serves 4 to 6
2 C. flour
1 t. baking soda
2 t. baking powder
1 T. brown sugar, packed
1 t. salt
1 t. cinnamon
2 eggs
1 3/4 C. buttermilk
1/2 C. fat free or light sour cream (you could also use plain yogurt in place of sour cream)
1/4 C. butter, melted
1 Granny smith apple, cored, peeled and grated

Combine flour, baking soda, baking powder, brown sugar, salt and cinnamon in a large mixing bowl; set aside. Mix eggs, buttermilk, sour cream and butter together; add to flour mixture. Fold in apple. You may want to add more buttermilk if you feel the batter is too thick. Pour 1/4 cup batter onto a greased hot griddle or non-stick pan. Heat until little bubbles form through the batter, then flip. Serve warm with apple syrup.

Puffy Apple Pancakes with Apple Syrup

When I was young, my mom would make German pancakes (or puffy pancakes) every now and then and we just loved them. The best part was watching the pancakes puff up really big. About a year ago I found a recipe for Austrian Apple pancakes in one of my cook books. Austrian Apple pancakes are similar to German pancakes except they have apples on the bottom. I think the recipe I have is good, but sometimes I have trouble getting the apples out so I changed the recipe a little and gave it a new name!

1 Granny Smith apple, peeled, cored, and sliced
1/4 C. butter, divided (I only had two table spoons of butter, so I used two table spoons of coconut oil as well and it added just a hint of coconut flavor that was really good!)
1/8 t. ground cinnamon
1 t. lemon juice
3 eggs
3/4 C. milk (I used Evaporated milk)
3/4 C. flour
1 T. sugar
Pinch of salt

Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Saute apple in 2 T. butter in a 10" oven-proof skillet over medium heat until golden and almost tender. Add lemon juice and cook for a minute longer. Today I added about 1/8 C. of brown sugar to the apples and let them cook for about a minute. Melt 2 T. of butter (in my case, coconut oil) in the microwave. In a medium bowl, beat eggs with milk, flour, sugar, salt and melted butter until smooth. Pour batter over apples in the hot pan and spread; do not stir. Place skillet in oven and bake until puffed and golden, 18-20 minutes. Pull out of the oven, loosen the edges with a rubber spatula and turn over onto a plate. WARNING! After loosening the edges with a spatula, don't forget that the handle of the pan is still really hot like I did! Very stupid and painful! Adding the brown sugar to the apples creates a syrup, so you really don't need to add syrup unless you love it like I do!