Easy & Healthy Vegan Carrot Cake Pancakes

If you love carrot cake, then these fluffy vegan carrot cake pancakes are perfect for you! They're made easily in one bowl with simple, healthy ingredients that you likely already have in your kitchen. It's seriously like having healthy cake for breakfast...what's better than that?

Made with oat flour,these carrot cake pancakes are vegan, gluten-free, oil-free, refined-sugar free and totally healthy. Even better, they're are super flavorful, easily customizable, and freezer-friendly. These pancakes are truly the perfect spring meal, whether it's for Easter brunch or a casual Sunday morning breakfast!

Jump to:

• Ingredients
• Instructions
• Recipe Substitutions & Variations
• Topping & Add-In Recommendations
• Expert Tips
• FAQ
• Other recipes you might like
• 📖 Recipe
• 💬 Reviews

This recipe was created for Take Two Foods, however this blog post is not sponsored. I just wanted to share the recipe with you, as it's perfect for Easter or a springtime breakfast!

Ingredients

Most of these ingredients are common household staples, so hopefully you won't need to spend any extra money or buy a product that you'll get little use out of just to make these!

• Flax eggs: to help bind the batter.
• Mashed ripe banana: will act as natural sweetener and also help to bind the batter.
• Non-dairy milk: for moisture and to help bind the ingredients.
• Vanilla Extract because why would skip it?
• Maple Syrup; for a bit more sweetness!
• Oat Flour: to make these pancakes nice and hearty.
• Baking powder: to help the pancakes rise to full fluff potential.
• Spices: we're using a medley of spices in order to replicate that classic carrot cake flavor! Cinnamon, nutmeg, ground ginger, and ground cloves are what make these pancakes super yummy.
• Salt: to help balance out the sweetness of the banana and maple syrup.
• Shredded Carrots: because would it be carrot cake pancakes without 'em?

Instructions

The best part about these vegan carrot cake recipes is how easy they are to make and that you only need 1 bowl to do it!

1. To a large bowl, add flaxseed meal and water. Let it set for at least 5 minutes to thicken. Add in the ripe banana and use a fork to mash it until it reaches a pudding like consistency. A few small lumps are okay to leave!
2. Add in the non-dairy milk, vanilla extract, and maple syrup. Whisk until combined. Now you can add in the oat flour, baking powder, spices, and salt. Whisk again until combined. Take notice of how the batter looks here, if it's too dry or runny, add either a touch more milk or oat flour to adjust. It should be a thick, yet pourable batter.
3. Shred your carrots using a grater as fine or chunky as you'd like and add to the batter. I left mine a bit chunky, as you can see in the image, because I like the added crunch. You can shred these as finely as grated parmesan, the recipe is yummy either way.
4. Heat a pan or griddle over medium heat, coating lightly with oil if needed. Scoop the batter using a ¼ cup measure for each pancake and add to the griddle, using the back of a spoon to spread them out a bit into circles. Cook for 3-4 minutes until the pancakes slightly puff up and you see the edge has lightly browned. Flip the pancakes and cook for another 3 minutes or until golden brown.
5. Serve immediately, topping with cream cheese frosting and toasted coconut flakes, and enjoy!

Recipe Substitutions & Variations

There's a number of different ways to switch up this recipe, if needed! Here are a few ideas to try:

• Use applesauce instead of banana. Replace the banana with a ½ cup of applesauce. If you do this, I would suggest reducing the baking powder to 2 teaspoons, since applesauce is a bit lighter and won't weigh down the batter as much as the mashed banana does.
• Use oats if you don't have oat flour! If you only have old-fashioned oats on hand, just blend 1 ½ cups in a blender or food processor for 1 minute. This will give you a fine oat flour! Once blended, measure out the 1 ¼ cup needed for this recipe.
• Use all-purpose flour or regular gluten-free flour! Use only 1 cup for either instead of 1 ¼ cup.
• Swap the maple syrup out for agave or sugar.

Topping & Add-In Recommendations

Here's a few of my favorite ways to serve these vegan carrot cake pancakes:

• Cream cheese frosting! This is what I did and it was perfection.
• Toasted coconut flakes (ooooh on top of the cream cheese frosting YES)
• Maple syrup
• Vegan ricotta
• Vegan greek yogurt
• Add raisins on top or mixed into the batter
• Add walnuts or pecans on top or chopped & mixed into the batter

Expert Tips

• Depending on the texture of your oat flour, you might need more or less non-dairy milk. After you've added all the ingredients except the carrots, check the batters consistency and adjust if needed by adding either more oat flour or non-dairy milk. It should be thick but pourable.
• Use whole carrots and grate them yourself, rather than buying the shredded carrots in a bag. This will make the pancakes taste as fresh as possible. Also, the bagged carrots are usually a bit too dry in comparison.
• If you've grated the carrots super finely, it will add a bit more moisture to the batter. Check the consistency after you've mixed the carrots in and see if you need to add a bit more oat flour.
• If the pancakes are browning too quickly, lower the heat of your stove or griddle. This will ensure the outsides don't burn and that the inside is actually cooked.

FAQ

Other recipes you might like

• Vegan Buttermilk Pancakes
• Vegan Belgian Waffles

If you make these pancakes, be sure to snap a pic and tag me on Instagram. If you have any questions or feedback at all, send me an e-mail or leave a comment below! I hope you love them as much as we do!

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