Last Updated on 7th July 2022 by
Sweet potato pancakes take the original pancake formula and give you something different but still delicious. I like to use fresh sweet potatoes when I make mine, but you can use pureed or canned sweet potatoes as well. All of these work really well to make a lovely stack of pancakes that’s perfect with a little butter pecan or maple sugar syrup over top of them. And then, when you top them with crushed pecans, they taste oh, so decadent.
It’s like dessert on your plate first thing in the morning, and doesn’t that sound wonderful? I’m going to share with you a recipe for how to make sweet potato pancakes from scratch, and you will end up with potatoes that are really fluffy, sweet, and delicious.
How to Prepare Sweet Potato Pancakes
Ingredients:
- 1 3/4 cups of flour
- 1/2 teaspoon of baking soda
- 2 teaspoons of baking powder
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 2 tablespoons of brown sugar
- 1/4 teaspoon of nutmeg
- 1 teaspoon of cinnamon
- 1/4 teaspoon of ground ginger
- 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract
- 2 eggs
- 2 small sweet potatoes, roasted and pureed (yields ¾ of a cup, approximately)
- 1 3/4 cups of buttermilk
- Butter, to serve
- Maple syrup or honey to top
- Toasted crushed pecans, to serve
Directions:
- . Mix together flour, baking soda, salt, baking powder, brown sugar, nutmeg, ginger, and cinnamon in a bowl.
- Mix your wet ingredients together in a separate bowl, combining sweet potato puree, butter milk, eggs, and vanilla. Make sure you mix the wet ingredients well, beating the eggs thoroughly.
- Pour the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients and stir just enough to combine them.
- Prepare a nonstick skillet by warming it on medium heat. Feel free to add a little butter or oil to keep the pancake batter from sticking. Reduce the heat to medium low.
- Once the skillet is warm, ladle out half a cup of sweet potato pancake batter into the skillet.
- Cook until it starts to turn golden brown underneath, which should take around 3 minutes, and then flip over and cook the other side for 2-3 minutes.
- Do this with the rest of your batter and then serve with crushed, toasted pecans, butter, and syrup.
How to Make Sweet Potato Pancakes with Pancake Mix
You can make this dish with a pancake mix as well. If you do it this way, it’ll save you a lot of work. The pancake mix tends to have all the dry ingredients you need, and you just need to supply the eggs, milk/buttermilk, sweet potato puree, and vanilla extract. Follow the direction on the pancake mix, but then add in pureed sweet potatoes as well when mixing the wet ingredients.
Remember that you will need about ¾ of a cup, and you can use canned sweet potatoes, premade sweet potato puree, or fresh sweet potatoes that you roast and puree yourself.
How to Make Vegan Sweet Potato Pancakes
The vegan version of sweet potato pancakes uses non-dairy milk rather than dairy milk and egg substitute instead of eggs. There are other substitutes you can use as well, but these are just some basic alternatives you can try. A variety of non-dairy milk options will work, like soy milk, rice milk, almond milk, and others. Most of them are completely interchangeable with regular dairy milk and eggs. You can use them in the same amounts, and you will end up with decent sweet potato pancakes.
You may find that the texture or fluffiness is not quite same with these substitutes. For each substitute, there may be small adjustments that need to be made to make them taste right and to give the pancakes the right texture.
How to Make Sweet Potato Pancakes without Flour
What if you want to make these pancakes without using flour and have a gluten free dish? Try using a coconut flour, rice flour, or another flour substitute. Check out the gluten-free section of the grocery to see what’s available. Many of these work as one-to-one substitutes for regular bleached flour.
You could also try a 2-ingreident version that uses ½ cup of cooked sweet potato and 2 eggs. This comes together really fast and cooks quickly too. Cook them like you would regular pancakes, but then be sure to season or garnish them with something flavorful. The two ingredients you use will make them rather bland, so they need something to flavor them with, whether that is cinnamon, maple syrup, nut butter spread, or hazelnut spread.
How to Make Sweet Potato Pancakes Healthy
Pancakes aren’t very healthy, as if the cake in the name was not indication enough. You will need to make some substitutions for a few of the ingredients if you want this dish to be a bit healthier.
Start by using coconut oil in place of butter or canola oil when you cook up the batter. Or if you have a nonstick pan, you may be able to leave off the oil entirely.
The sugar is another ingredient that needs to be targeted for healthiness. Try using a sugar substitute that is better for you or simply cutting back on the amount of sugar you use in the recipe.
Watch the syrup you are using as well. Aim for a sugar free or low sugar syrup or try a healthier topping, like cinnamon, agave syrup, or honey as a sweetener. Keep in mind that sweet potatoes are already a bit sweet, so you may not need any sugar in your recipe, especially if you use a sweet milk like almond milk that’s not as bad for you as sugar.
All of these changes can make a difference in how healthy your sweet potato pancakes are. Breakfast is one of those meals where people are often not very conscious about their health. By making conscious decisions about what you eat and controlling what goes into your food by making it yourself, you will make it easier to eat healthy.
I'm Pauline, a mother of four grown children, my passion for cooking stemmed from the joy i get cooking for my family. I love to try new dishes, especially when dining out but creating and sharing my own recipes is my favourite thing to do!
