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Vanilla pancakes are the perfect lazy weekend breakfast! I’ve been making this foolproof recipe for years (ever since I lived abroad without pancake mix). They’re made using only 7 pantry-staple ingredients you probably already have.
save this recipe!Any pancake recipe that doesn’t use a store-bought mix is a winner! Even more so if the recipe is so easy that you can make it with your eyes closed. Spoiler alert: these pancakes check both boxes!
These vanilla pancakes are basically the love child of my love for homemade Sunday breakfast combined with my degree in food science. In less than half an hour, you’ll find yourself with ten fluffy, delicious, and tender pancakes!
Recipe Improved
This recipe has been retested and improved since I first published it in 2020 to fix slight flavor issues that some readers have commented on. Thank you everyone for your input. This community wouldn’t be the same without you!
Reader rating
“I make these pancakes for my family a lot and we all love them! Thanks for posting this AMAZING recipe!” —Jisoo
Veganize these pancakes
This is one of the easiest dishes to make into a vegan-friendly recipe. Here are the ingredients you’ll have to omit along with ideas for replacements.
- Milk: Instead of cow’s milk, use the plant-based milk of your choice. Vanilla soy milk would work well, as would almond or oat milk. They can also be plain and unsweetened.
- Egg: Instead of an egg in this recipe, flax seeds work really well. To replace one egg, mix one tablespoon of flax meal (ground flax seeds) with three tablespoons of hot water.
- Butter: Simply use the plant-based butter of your choice!
Syrup is the obvious topping choice, but I love these pancakes with rhubarb compote or no-pectin jam!
Better-Than-Bisquick Vanilla Pancakes
Ingredients
- 1 ½ cup flour
- 2 Tbsp white sugar
- 1 Tbsp baking powder
- ½ tsp salt
- 1 ¼ cup milk, or plant-based milk, like vanilla soy
- 1 large egg
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 4 Tbsp butter, or dairy-free alternative
Instructions
- Stir Dry Ingredients: Stir together 1 ½ cup flour, 2 Tbsp white sugar, 1 Tbsp baking powder, and ½ tsp salt in a large bowl.
- Stir Wet Ingredients: In a separate bowl whisk 1 ¼ cup milk, 1 large egg, and 1 tsp vanilla extract. In a separate bowl, melt 4 Tbsp butter in the microwave, then drizzle it into the milk mixture while whisking (it will solidify; that's okay).
- Combine: Add milk mixture to the flour mixture, stirring until mostly combined (some lumps in the batter is okay, do not over stir). Let rest for about 5 minutes to maximize their fluffiness.
- Cook: Lightly grease or butter a large saute pan and set over medium heat. Once hot, spoon in ¼ cup portions of batter, leaving space between each pancake. Cook for 2 to 3 minutes, until bubbles form on the surface, the edges look set, and the underside is golden brown. Flip and cook another 1 to 2 minutes, until the second side is golden and the pancakes spring back when gently pressed. Adjust heat as needed to keep them from browning too quickly.
- Serve: Set oven to 200°F (95°C). Keep cooked pancakes warm by setting on a baking sheet and keeping then in the oven while you finish cooking the rest of the pancakes.
Nutrition
Nutrition information calculated by Sarah Bond, degreed nutritionist.
did you make this?Leave a comment below and tag @liveeatlearn on social media! I love seeing what you’ve made!
I appreciate the recipe! However, I tried making this and it came out terribly. Why? Tablespoon of baking powder. Even when covered in syrup these “paincakes” were WAY too sharp/salty. Maybe an experienced baker would know that’s wrong right off the bat, but as someone who is really just starting out, it ruined the recipe, wasted my time, and ingredients. Please correct that measurement (assuming it was supposed to be a teaspoon) if it was a mistake. Regardless, thank you for sharing the recipe!
Nothing makes you feel dumb like pouring cold milk over melted butter and realizing you just solidified the butter to the bowl. I had to heat the milk and butter to release the butter from the bowl. I should’ve known them that this recipe would be a disaster, but I continued on.
The batter was too runny with too much milk and salt overall. I added more flour in an attempt to fix it with minimal success. Due to having the heat the milk, it made the baking powder useless and the batter never rose or bubbled.
If you tried this recipe and had bad results, don’t feel bad! I picked this randomly from Google for Easter breakfast with the family. You guessed it … nobody ate it. Disappointed to say the least.
These were way too runny for me. The first one came out paper thin. It was also really bland. I salvaged the mix by adding a lot more flour to thicken and cooked in butter. My Mom is eating them but I haven’t gotten her usual ‘delicious’ comment that I got with another recipe.
Made this with my youngest for brunch, delicious! Added a full teaspoon of vanilla as we like it nice and vanillary!
Good recipe overall. I halved the salt and baking powder. They turned out great.
I was excited to try the recipe but they were disgusting. No vanilla or pancake flavor, they were salty and just all over gross.
Theses ar amazing and it was so easy to make.
I tried the recipe and it wasn’t that good. I reduced the salt by half and the recipe had too much baking soda. It can also have more sugar. I compared this recipe with Pearl Miller Company (Aunt Jamima) and Pearl Miller Company tasted so much better.
Hi Sarah! I make these pancakes for my family a lot and we all love them! Thanks for posting this AMAZING recipe!
So happy to hear you all loved them, Jisoo! 😀
This is a note for everyone on the basic ratios of pancake batter. Disclaimer: I haven’t made this pancake recipe myself, but I have made “from scratch” pancakes my entire life and do it from memory while changing ingredients as I feel like it. My most memorable pancake error was the day that I totally forgot to add in my leavening agents. It turns out that pancakes taste terrible without leaveners.
I noticed that the comments on this recipe were wildly different in opinion. I think that it’s important to note that every single person has a different set of tastebuds and, in particular, the level of saltiness that is normal to them. For example, I am super sensitive to salty food and am always looking for the “no salt added” or “low salt” versions of food such as ordering french fries with no salt. I have a relative who is the opposite of me and they enjoy foods being super duper, extra salty. But back to pancakes:
Baking POWDER is not salty. Baking SODA is VERY salty. So my first question to anyone who makes a recipe calling for either powder, soda, or both is “Did you add the correct ingredient in the correct amount?” In baking, we usually will use around twice as much baking POWDER as we would baking SODA so while 1 tablespoon of baking POWDER might seem like a lot, it would be unusual for it to come out salty. However, 1 tablespoon of baking SODA would be downright terrible** in any pancake recipe of this size.
Assuming that, yes, you did add the correct ingredient in the correct amount, my second question would be “Did you use self-rising flour?” Self-rising flour contains baking POWDER and SALT in addition to flour. So, if you answered yes, then you unknowingly added almost 2 teaspoons baking POWDER and 3/8 teaspoon salt to your bowl (per 1.5 cups of flour) on top of the 1 tablespoon and 1 teaspoon of the respective ingredients and so that is why it is salty. Unless a recipe specifically calls for self-rising flour, you should always assume that “flour” is “all-purpose flour”.
My third question would be “Did you add the right amount of regular, plain TABLE salt?” Do not use sea salt, coarse salt, salt that you ground yourself, etc. In baking, unless specifically noted, we ALWAYS use plain old TABLE salt and it should be a LEVEL measurement. That means don’t eyeball how much salt is in your teaspoon unless you have a lot of practice eyeballing it specifically for baking. A level measurement means to actually pull out a dinner knife (or other straight object) and use the straight edge (typically the back of the dinner knife) to scrape any and all excess salt off of your teaspoon before you add the salt into your dry ingredients.
My fourth question would be “Do you live close to sea level or at a higher elevation?” Both baking powder AND baking soda are much more efficient at higher elevations so you would need to reduce the quantity according to your elevation or local air pressure. There are lots of websites dedicated to discussing high-altitude or low air pressure baking so definitely do your research to figure out what baking modifications work best for your particular city or elevation.
But what if you added the right amount of baking POWDER, used all-purpose flour and TABLE salt, and you live at a low elevation (or already made the adjustments for HA baking) and it still tastes salty? This is where we circle back to the beginning…..some foods will just taste more or less salty to different people and then you just need to alter the recipe for your individual taste buds.
Options to alter this recipe to make it less salty: 1) use less salt—try reducing by 1/4-1/2 of a teaspoon, 2) use unsalted butter instead of salted butter, or 3) reduce the baking POWDER—try reducing by 25%-50% depending on saltiness. I would definitely try #1 and #2 before #3.
**If you happen to make the very common mistake of putting in baking SODA when the recipe called for baking POWDER (like my brother did once), try quadrupling the rest of this pancake recipe and adding a bit of lemon juice or white vinegar to your milk to provide the acid needed to start the leavening process. If you are wondering why I am telling you to curdle your milk, it’s because baking SODA requires an acid in order to produce the bubbles that make your pancakes fluffy. Baking POWDER does not need any acid and so is very happy to start bubbling with a liquid such as regular milk.
My son wanted vanilla pancakes came across this recipe. I wish i could share a photo of how light and fluffy. Will save this recipe. I already shared this with all my friends. Its a keeper. I actually added some oat flour to it. Sooo good thank you
I’m so happy to hear it, Patrish! Enjoy! 😀