For those embracing a vegan and ketogenic lifestyle, finding satisfying and compliant breakfast options can sometimes feel like a challenge. But fear not, pancake lovers! These recipes for vegan keto pancakes offer a delightful way to start your day, providing a guilt-free indulgence that aligns with your dietary goals. These pancakes are not only delicious but also packed with nutrients, making them a wholesome choice for breakfast, lunch, or even dinner.
What is Vegan Keto?
In a nutshell, the keto diet consists of low-carb, high-fat foods. Vegan keto combines the principles of a ketogenic diet, which is high in fats and low in carbohydrates, with veganism, which excludes all animal products. This means avoiding meat, dairy, eggs, and honey while focusing on plant-based fats, proteins, and low-carb vegetables.
Why Choose Vegan Keto Pancakes?
These pancakes offer a multitude of health benefits when prepared as directed. They are a fantastic way to enjoy a classic breakfast treat while staying true to your dietary commitments.
- Low in Carbs: Traditional pancakes are often loaded with sugar and refined flour, making them unsuitable for a keto diet. Vegan keto pancakes, however, utilize low-carb flours like almond and coconut flour to keep the carb count minimal.
- High in Healthy Fats: These recipes incorporate ingredients like coconut milk, almond butter, and coconut oil, providing a good source of healthy fats that are essential for a ketogenic lifestyle.
- Vegan-Friendly: By excluding eggs and dairy, these pancakes cater to vegans, offering a plant-based alternative to traditional pancake recipes.
- Customizable: One of the best parts of these versatile recipes is the ability to customize these keto pancakes.
Key Ingredients for Vegan Keto Pancakes
- Almond Flour: With 15 net grams of carbs in a cup, almond flour is perfect for low-carb eaters.
- Coconut Flour: This flour is a low carb, high fat, and high fiber flour that’s a great option to use on a keto diet!
- Almond Milk: With just 1 gram of net carb in each cup, almond milk is one of the best milks on a low-carb diet.
- Tapioca Flour: As grain flours and most gluten-free flours have too many carbohydrates in them, making them unsuitable for a vegan low-carb diet. However, neither has gluten, which helps the pancakes bind and rise. Non-vegan keto pancakes use eggs to keep things together, but as we don't use those, tapioca flour is another binder that's also relatively lower in carbs.
- Flaxseed Meal: You can stir in a couple of tablespoons of flaxmeal into the dough if you want more fiber and healthy fat.
- Full-Fat Coconut Milk: This adds nutrients, creaminess, and tasty flavor to this recipe.
Basic Vegan Keto Pancake Recipe
Here's a foundational recipe for vegan keto pancakes, followed by variations to tantalize your taste buds:
Ingredients:
- 2 cups superfine almond flour
- ½ cup coconut flour
- 2 tablespoons tapioca flour
- 2 teaspoons egg replacer
- ½ cup vegan yogurt
- 2 ½ cups almond milk
- Oil for greasing
Instructions:
- Mix all the dry ingredients - the flours, egg replacer, baking powder and baking soda and salt -- in a bowl.
- Add the yogurt and almond milk to the bowl and mix. If the batter seems a bit dry, add more almond milk, but keep in mind this shouldn't look like a regular pancake batter--it will be thicker, scoopable but not pourable.
- Heat a griddle and brush it generously with oil. Using a quarter cup measure, scoop out pancakes on the hot griddle and help form them into rounds using the bottom of the cup.
- Give the pancakes time to set--it will take a little longer than it does for regular wheat pancakes. When you see bubbles toward the center and the edges look dry, carefully slide a thin spatula under the pancake and flip.
- These pancakes are tender, especially when they are hot, so be careful or they could fall apart. Cook the other side a little longer than you would regular pancakes because, again, these will take some time to set up and you don't want raw batter in the middle. If the batter looks dryer than what you are used to, don't worry--that's exactly how it should look. The batter for these pancakes will be scoopable, not pourable. These pancakes will take longer to set than your regular pancakes, and they will be very tender, especially when hot, although they will firm up once they stand for a bit. So take care when you flip them, and give them about five minutes after taking them off the griddle and before eating them to make sure they firm up nicely.
- If you are a low-carb eater, you can eat these by themselves--they are surprisingly sweet because of the almond and coconut flours--or with a sprinkling of a keto-approved sweetener, like stevia or erythritol or monkfruit. You can also buy many brands of keto maple syrup now. If you want more fiber and healthy fat in here, stir in a couple of tablespoons of flaxmeal into the dough.
Savory Vegan Keto Pancakes
These Savory Vegan Keto Pancakes are amazingly fluffy and packed with flavor. My preference is usually to grab savory over sweet for breakfast any day of the week. These vegan savory keto pancakes are SO easy to make; only one dish to throw all the ingredients in and mix, and lastly, wait patiently for them to cook. What makes them dairy-free is my choice to use a can of full-fat coconut milk instead of regular milk. The result is still a moist and delicious pancake.
Read also: Vegan Diet for Diabetes Management
Finely chop the red onion, cilantro leaves, red bell pepper, and jalapenos, if you are using them, and set them aside. Heat an Ebelskiver pan or skillet to medium-high heat. Spoon the prepared batter using a mini muffin scoop onto the pan and cook for about 3-4 minutes on each side until golden brown. Originating from Denmark, the ebelskiver pan is typically cast iron and heats evenly throughout. It is traditionally used to make round ball-shaped Danish pancakes.
But before you get going with this batter, here are a few key things to remember, if you don’t have an Ebelskiver pan, don’t stress it, using a skillet is just fine.
Delicious Variations to Try
Once you've mastered the basic recipe, explore these exciting variations:
Keto Blueberry Pancakes
Stir a pinch of cinnamon into the batter if desired. Press a few blueberries onto each pancake right after pouring the batter into the pan. Or sliced strawberries, blackberries, or raspberries work too.
Lemon Pancakes
Add two teaspoons lemon juice and the zest of one lemon to the mix before cooking the pancakes. Top with sugar free powdered sugar if you wish.
Read also: Vegan Diet for Bodybuilding
Low Carb Coconut Pancakes
Stir a handful of shredded coconut into the batter.
Keto Vegan Pancakes
The pancakes are naturally dairy free, with no milk or butter required.
Keto Banana Pancakes
Using half of a banana in the recipe, one serving of these keto banana pancakes contains 11.3g net carbs. For some, their bodies can tolerate this amount of carbs and stay in ketosis! For others, maybe not. You have to decide what’s right for you.
Tips for Perfect Vegan Keto Pancakes
- Batter Consistency: The batter for these pancakes will be scoopable, not pourable. If the batter seems a bit dry, add more almond milk, but keep in mind this shouldn't look like a regular pancake batter--it will be thicker.
- Cooking Time: These pancakes will take longer to set than your regular pancakes, and they will be very tender, especially when hot, although they will firm up once they stand for a bit. So take care when you flip them, and give them about five minutes after taking them off the griddle and before eating them to make sure they firm up nicely.
- Flipping: These pancakes are tender, especially when they are hot, so be careful or they could fall apart. The first few times you might want to make smaller pancakes to make flipping them easier.
- Sweetness: If you are a low-carb eater, you can eat these by themselves--they are surprisingly sweet because of the almond and coconut flours--or with a sprinkling of a keto-approved sweetener, like stevia or erythritol or monkfruit. You can also buy many brands of keto maple syrup now.
- Pan Temperature: When the pan is hot (test it by adding a droplet of water to the pan - if it sizzles, the pan is ready), drop on small ladles of batter and press down. Don’t make them too big or they’ll be done on the edges before the centers have a chance to cook.
Serving and Storage Suggestions
These pancakes are very filling and two are more than enough for a moderate eater--that meal will add only seven net carbs to your daily count. But you don't have to be on a low-carb diet to enjoy these. They are so delicious. Tender and fluffy, it's like eating dessert for breakfast, only way healthier.
Leftover keto pancakes can be stacked with a layer of parchment paper between each pancake and stored in a lidded airtight container in the refrigerator for about three to four days. When ready to eat, simply reheat the pancakes in a skillet on the stovetop or in the microwave. It is best not to freeze these pancakes as the structure of the ingredients changes when frozen.
Read also: Lose Weight with Veganism
A Note on Ingredients and Dietary Needs
These bad boys are grain free, gluten free, nut free, soy free and sugar free. They’re also egg free and dairy free by virtue of being vegan, and are keto friendly to boot!