These spiced buttermilk pancakes are easy to make, served with apple maple syrup, a topping made from maple syrup cooked with apples.
Flavouring pancakes
You can take your favourite buttermilk pancake from scratch recipe and spice it up for fall with cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, and a pinch of cloves, or really any fall spice will work. These are great ways of adding flavour to pancakes without too much of an impact on texture. You can also consider substituting part of the all-purpose flour with whole wheat or even oats, knowing that the oats will absorb more liquid than the flour.
You can also try adding fruit, like blueberries or diced apples, though sometimes fruit can make pancakes a little soggy if you aren't careful. That's where adding fruit to your syrup or topping might be a better option. It's why a Dutch baby pancake is best served with fresh fruit on top after baking, rather than trying to incorporate them into the batter.
Apple maple syrup topping
You can make a fun topping for pancakes by cooking and caramelizing diced apples with sugar, and deglazing them with maple syrup. The apple pieces candy in the syrup and become translucent and soft, as the syrup is infused with apple flavour. It's sweet, a little tangy from the tart apples. It's the perfect accompaniment to pancakes in the fall. If you are looking for a different kind of pancake, try my *slightly* healthier Greek yogurt pancakes.
I love to bake with maple and this apple maple syrup is definitely a winner to add to my growing list of maple syrup recipes.
Spiced buttermilk pancakes with apple maple syrup
Ingredients
For the pancakes
- 190 grams (1½ cups) bleached all-purpose flour
- 2.5 mL (½ teaspoon) Diamond Crystal fine kosher salt
- 2.5 mL (½ teaspoon) baking soda
- 2.5 mL (½ teaspoon) baking powder
- 15 mL (1 tablespoon) granulated sugar
- 3.75 mL (¾ teaspoon) ground cinnamon
- 0.625 mL (⅛ teaspoon) ground nutmeg
- 0.625 mL (⅛ teaspoon) ground ginger
- 1 pinch ground cloves
- 28 grams (2 tablespoon) unsalted butter, melted, plus more for frying the pancakes
- 190 mL (¾ cup) buttermilk (1 % fat)
- 125 mL (½ cup) whole milk (3.25 % fat)
- 5 mL (1 teaspoon) pure vanilla extract
- 2 large egg(s), separated
Apple maple syrup
- 2 Cortland apple(s), I used Cortlands
- 150 grams (¾ cup) granulated sugar
- 190 mL (¾ cup) pure maple syrup, plus more for serving
Instructions
- Whisk together the flour, salt, baking soda, baking powder, sugar, and spices in a medium bowl. Set aside.
- In a small bowl, whisk together the melted butter, buttermilk, milk, vanilla, and the egg yolks. Pour the wet mixture over the whisked dry mixture, and stir with the whisk to combine. Set aside.
- In a medium bowl, beat the egg whites to soft peaks. Fold the beaten egg whites into the batter, quickly, and set the batter aside while you prepare the fry pan.
- Preheat a non-stick frying pan over medium heat til it’s good and hot. Add a dollop of butter, and let it melt, swishing it around with a spatula. Dollop half-ladles (or so) of the pancake batter onto the preheated pan, and cook the pancakes, flipping when the bottom-side is golden brown and the top batter is bubbly.
- When all the pancakes are fried, you can keep them hot in a warmed oven while you make the syrup.
- To make the syrup: Toss the diced apples with the sugar in a bowl. Wipe down the frying pan and add the sugar coated apples to it on medium heat, stirring. The sugar will melt while the apple cooks and releases its juice. Continue cooking til the sugar has caramelized, then remove the pan from the heat and deglaze with the maple syrup. Return the pan to the heat, and simmer for a few minutes to thicken (about 3 minutes on medium heat). If you had any lumps of sugar crystals form at the beginning, they should dissolve at this stage.
- Serve the pancakes drizzled with apple maple syrup, and more maple syrup if you dare. A dollop of crème fraiche or yogurt is really nice too!
Nutrition
Medeja says
Oh I would love them for breakfast! 🙂
motherrimmy says
I'm sorry you had to deal with a tooth infection. I've had one myself and they are no fun. I was definitely glad when it was over. These pancakes look like the perfect way to celebrate the end of that experience.
Roxana | Roxana's Home Baking says
please stop talking about dentist, early next month I have to go and have my braces put on :((
But I should probably have a stack of these buttermilk the morning I head to the orthodontics office
Jackie says
Hi
How do you measure 200ML of buttermilk?
Janice Lawandi says
Hi Jackie, you've got two options: a measuring cup or you can weigh out 200 grams, which is 7oz on a scale! Hope that helps and let me know how your pancakes work out 🙂
Jackie says
Hi Janice
ML and GRAMS are considered the same thing on a scale.
Janice Lawandi says
Hi Jackie, it's true that some scales do have a "mL" button on them, but I don't recommend using it. The button assumes that everything you will weigh has the same density, but this is not the case.