Tag Archives: grain free pancakes

Corona Cooking: Lentil Pancakes

dairy free, gluten free, reduced refined sugar, soy free 2 Comments

Let’s be creative….

I spoke with a friend yesterday who told me she was using the forced time at home to bake bread because it helped to keep her sane. I imagine many of us can identify – not necessarily with baking homemade bread, but with needing ways to keep our sanity during the COVID-19 circumstances.

In our house, we currently have five folks living life virtually – online classes, work meetings, church activities, music lessons, writing groups  – all vying for time on our WiFi connection and requiring us to find privates spaces throughout the house where we will not bother one another.

Add to that I am cooking our meals with the staples I have on hand because we are abiding by our state governor’s “stay at home” advisory because we have a family of “at-risk” folks for whom getting the corona virus would not be good. Since I always keep a well stocked pantry, finding items to make is not the problem. The difficulty is being creative so we are not eating the same foods all the time.

A couple of days ago, I wanted to use up the leftover lentils I had in the fridge from a lentil curry I had made for dinner one night. I was “feeling like” pancakes for some reason, so I googled lentil pancakes to see if that was an actual thing. It turned out it is, but that the options weren’t quite what I wanted.  Either I could make pancakes which were simply crushed lentils and spices or I could make a basic pancake recipe which just had about 1/2 cup of lentils added.

So, I had to go to work to create something of my own – a pancake which was chock-full of lentils but was still a pancake so my youngest wouldn’t turn his nose up to the idea. The result was surprisingly good. I made up a curry sauce of tofu sour cream, curry powder and soy milk which three of the family members dolloped onto the pancakes, while the other two chose to eat the pancakes with maple syrup. The recipe follows for anyone who also might have leftover cooked lentils in need of revamping, and  as a bonus for folks who need it –  these are grain free, too.

Lentil Pancakes

Ingredients:

4 cups cooked lentils

1 cup dairy free milk (oat, flax, soy, etc….)

1/2 tsp cumin powder

1/2 tsp garlic powder

1/2 tsp onion powder

1/2 tsp curry powder

1/2 tsp salt

1/4 tsp pepper

1 cup chopped green onions

1 cup liquid egg whites (can also just use whole eggs, which would be about 4)

2 cups garbanzo bean (chickpea) flour

2 tsp baking powder

Cooking Instructions:

  1. Puree cooked lentils in a food processor until only slightly lumpy. You can puree them completely smooth, if desired, but I prefer a little texture.
  2. Add to the pureed lentils, your choice of dairy free milk, the cumin, garlic, onion, and cumin powders, salt and pepper, and green onions, and mix well.
  3. Add the liquid egg whites and mix well.
  4. Add the flour and mix until all the flour is completely mixed in.
  5. Add the baking powder and stir until completely dissolved.
  6. To cook the pancakes with a griddle, heat to 350 degrees. On the stove top, heat a skillet over medium heat. If you are not using nonstick pans, you’ll need to grease your pan in between batches with your preferred method.
  7. Use a 1/4 cup to scoop batter onto the griddle or skillet. The batter will spread. When the edges begin to look a bit dry and little air pockets surface in the middle, flip the pancake. Usually, this won’t take longer than a minute. The pancake will begin to rise. Allow it to cook until you no longer see hot air escaping and the sides are cooked through. This usually takes about a minute.
  8. When you remove the pancakes, you can put them in a single layer on a cookie sheet in the oven on your lowest heat to keep them warm or move them to a cooling rack to cool if you are cooking them to be eaten at another time.

 

 

 

 

Advertisement

Creative Cooking: Grain Free Spice Pancakes

dairy free, gluten free, nut/peanut free, reduced refined sugar Leave a comment

“Nope, none at all….”

Whenever I lead a workshop, inevitably someone asks me my opinion about all the “diets” which are being lauded these days which advocate restricting this or that. I always tell folks that they and their doctors know best for their health, but as a general rule for many people, as long as there are no health issues, I believe in a diet which moderately mixes the food groups – healthy vegetables and fruit, lean proteins like fish, chicken, beans and tofu, and whole grains like barley, oats, and quinoa – with a healthy baked treat every so often. Add in a doctor approved exercise regiment, and you’re good to go, in my opinion.

Lately, though, I seem to be meeting more and more folks who can’t eat any grains at all for a variety of health related reasons, and they find themselves frustrated that foods they enjoyed may be a thing of the past. Fortunately, there are many grain free flours these days. The most common on the market and easily found in supermarkets are almond, coconut, bean, and cassava flours.

For cooking needs, such as breading chicken or fish or thickening a sauce, these grain free flours work the same way that regular flour does and needs no adjustments.  When using them for baking, the number one consideration is that these flours require more moisture so often you need to increase the number of eggs or the amount of liquid ingredient being used. I often just begin with 1/4 cup increase to start and experiment from there.

Almond and cassava flours tend to work best if you’re looking for a 1 to 1 substitute. Coconut flour is much more absorbent so you can usually only use up to 1/3 cup for every cup of flour you are substituting. Bean flours are heavier so you should decrease the amount to 3/4 cup for every cup of regular flour. For all the flours, they bake best in items such as pancakes, muffins, waffles, shallow quick breads, and cookies. If you want to use them in cakes, you need to mix them with lighter grain free flours like tapioca or arrowroot flours.

For this post, I made a garbanzo bean and cassava flour pancake, heavy with Autumn spices, which is filling and substantial so folks can make due with just one or two for a protein-filled breakfast. They have the added benefit of not having any sugar in them. We topped ours with sauteed, seasonal apples, and they were yummy.

Grain Free Spice Pancakes

Ingredients:

1 1/2 cup garbanzo bean flour

1/2 cup cassava flour

1 1/2 tsp baking soda

2 tsp cinnamon

1 tsp nutmeg

1/2 tsp ginger

1/2 tsp salt

1 cup unsweetened dairy free milk (we used soy but flax or oat or almond work, too)

1 tbsp lemon juice

2 eggs

1/4 plant based oil (we used safflower but extra light olive oil or avocado oil would work, too)

Cooking Instructions:

  1. Mix together the garbanzo bean and cassava flours with the baking soda, cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger and salt. Set aside.
  2. Blend together the unsweetened milk with the lemon juice, and add the eggs and oil.
  3. Combine the dry ingredients with the wet and mix until well blended.
  4. Heat a griddle at 325 to 350 degrees or a skillet on the stove on medium heat. If either is nonstick, no additional greasing is needed. If neither are nonstick, then you’ll need to grease your pan with your preferred method.
  5. Pour 1/4 cup of batter for each pancake and let it cook for a minute or two until the edges become dry. Flip and finish cooking on the other side for 30 seconds to a minute. Your pancake will rise and be golden on both side when they are done.
  6. To keep the pancakes warm, put them into a glass container with a lid and put them into a preheated oven on the lowest setting (mine is 170 degrees). To cool, put them on a wire rack, and then stack them in a container to keep in the fridge. To reheat, just popped them into the toaster or in the microwave. They freeze well, too.