If you are looking for the best pancake recipe to make from scratch, you’ve found it! A simple combination of ingredients you likely have on hand (flour, milk, eggs, baking powder) makes these easy pancakes the perfect breakfast!
Fluffy, flavorful and delicious.
Tips for Perfection
- HEAT Cook over medium heat. It takes longer but the results are better (a non-stick skillet works best).
- OIL Oil the pan and allow it to heat up. Before making the frist batch, give it a gentle wipe with paper towels to remove any big blobs of oil. This will give you perfectly browned pancakes.
- BATTER The batter should be slightly lumpy (image below) and should pour easily but should not be runny.
- If it’s too thick add milk a tablespoon or two at a time.
- If it’s too runny or you’ve accidentally added too much liquid, you can add a bit of flour to get the right consistency.
- FLIP Flip the pancakes with a spatula once bubbles begin to form and the bubbles near the edges start to pop.
- MIX-INS Add your mix ins on top of the pancakes once you’ve poured the batter into the skillet instead of stirring them into the batter. This keeps mixins from burning onto the pan.
How to Make Pancakes (from scratch)
BATTER
You’ll love how simple it is to whip these up. It’s as easy as 1, 2, 3!
- Mix dry ingredients together with a whisk (this adds air to the flour, almost like sifting it).
- Whisk wet ingredients together thoroughly with the melted butter.
- Make a well in the middle of the flour mixture and pour wet ingredient mixture in. Mix, but not too much, your batter should be a bit lumpy!
HOW TO COOK PANCAKES
Test an electric griddle or pan for temperature. Spill a droplet of water onto the surface and if it sizzles, it’s ready but don’t make it too hot or the pancakes will burn before they’re cooked in the middle!
- Pour 1/4 cup of batter into pan.
- Wait until bubbles form in the middle and they just begin to pop along the edges. The edges should be a little bit browned.
- Flip and cook the other side.
You can do a few at a time or more, depending on how big your cooking surface is. Transfer pancakes to a warm (200°F) oven. Just have an open casserole dish waiting in the oven to receive the freshly cooked flapjacks! That way they stay nice and hot, and you can serve them all at once at the table along with other fixings.
Make Ahead/How to Reheat Pancakes
I often keep a batch of homemade pancake mix in my cupboard to make pancakes easy but on weekdays we like to have them ready to go so all they need is warming.
Much like crepes, pancakes can be refrigerated for up to 5 days and kept in the freezer for 2 months. Just seal them in a freezer bag or an airtight container for storage (with a piece of parchment in between).
To Reheat Pancakes
Toaster: Pop homemade pancakes straight into the toaster. And it makes them a tiny bit crisp which is delicious.
Microwave: The microwave works too, just heat about 20-30 seconds for 1 serving.
Easy Breakfast Recipes
- Make Ahead Egg Muffins
- Overnight Oats
- Breakfast Burritos (Freezer Friendly)
- Blueberry Bran Muffins
- Quick and Easy French Toast
Perfectly Fluffy Pancakes
Equipment
Ingredients
- 2 cups flour
- 2 tablespoons sugar or to taste
- 4 teaspoons baking powder
- ½ teaspoon baking soda
- ¼ teaspoon salt
- 1 ¾ cups milk or as needed
- 2 eggs
- 2 tablespoons melted butter or vegetable oil
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
Instructions
- Whisk milk, eggs, melted butter, and vanilla.
- Combine dry ingredients in a bowl and whisk.
- Create a well in the middle and add wet ingredients. Stir just until combined, batter should look slightly lumpy. It should be slightly thick but should still be able to pour fairly smoothly. You may need to add a bit more milk.
- Preheat a griddle or frying pan over medium heat (or to 350°F). Lightly grease with butter or olive oil.
- Pour ¼ cup batter for each pancake and cook on one side until bubbles form and begin to pop, about 2 minutes. Flip and cook on the other side about 1-2 minutes.
Video
Notes
Nutrition Information
Nutrition information provided is an estimate and will vary based on cooking methods and brands of ingredients used.
Course Breakfast
Cuisine American© SpendWithPennies.com. Content and photographs are copyright protected. Sharing of this recipe is both encouraged and appreciated. Copying and/or pasting full recipes to any social media is strictly prohibited. Please view my photo use policy here.
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Favorite Pancake Toppings
My kids’ absolute favorite thing to do to pancakes, is to spread them with seedless raspberry jam, then drizzle warmed up heavy cream and a sprinkle of cinnamon over them. Trust me when I say this is actually a delicious combination! Other favorite toppings include:
- Butter and real maple syrup, of course!
- Whipped cream and honey… delicious on crepes, too!
- Sliced strawberries… or blackberries, raspberries, blueberries…or all four!!
- Sprinkles, like these fun birthday cake pancakes!
- Various kinds of jam with clotted cream!
- Nutella… this is basically like having dessert for breakfast!
- Cinnamon with a homemade cream cheese topping.
Easy, made perfect fluffy pancakes. Delicious! Depending on your salt tolerance you could probably add a pinch more salt to the batter.
my pancakes came out splendid. thankbyou.
Definitely be careful with the baking powder!!! Even after mixing and doing my best to remove the clumps there was chunks of baking powder in the pancakes and it was awful! My poor toddler was crying his head off over it. Definitely won’t be using the baking powder like this again. Otherwise the pancakes would been great!
Same. These are awful. Waaaaay too much baking powder. I followed the recipe exactly. My daughter has been begging for pancakes for weeks and I thought I’d try this one. She ate one and won’t finish. I can barely finish either. Not good.
Heidi is unfortunate your try at this recipe was a bust. My working this recipe, I found was too wet. So I added 3/4 cup more flour, 1tsp. sugar, a splash more vanilla. Adjusting liquids to perfection is a matter of trial and error. In your capable handsHeidi
Make sure your baking soda & baking powder are FRESH. Either being flat will render these tough and flat. Otherwise, yum-yum with real maple syrup.
Tops for lightness, and flavour! These pancakes are the absolute best! Freezing the extras and interested in how they turn out.
These are not fluffy. They can out flat and hard.
not in love with this recipe. idk what the deal was but it was dry as heck. had to add a TON of milk to it just to get it mixed and it was still dry when cooked.
I have made dozens of pancake recipes from Pinterest and they all seem to be flat and flavorless. This recipe is delicious and they are actually thick and fluffy! Saving this one and will be our new go to!! Thank you !!
OMG this is the best recipe ever!!!
Adding this one to my personal recipe binder.
Followed the recipe exactly. These are perfect in every way. I like to make some with mini choco chips, blueberries, and bacon! Thanks for the recipe :)
Wow!! I have never had such fluffy pancakes before!
these are so tasty and very easy to make. we even havve7 them for supper at times
Pretty tasty. Added some cinnamon too. Very fluffy, will be using this recipe for now on.
Made your pancake recipe was really fluffy and really good I will definitely make again I added some mashed bananas to it and was so good one of the best!
I would not make these again. They were terribly runny and stuck to the nonstick griddle.
If i could give you ten stars I would! Ms. Ma’am these was the best pancakes I ever made! I have tried more than 30 different pancake recipes to no avail! I’m on dialysis and I must make all my things from scratch especially pancakes, waffles, biscuits, baked goods due to phosphorus levels in boxed mixes so I’m just so happy I found this recipe thank you so much for sharing. Btw all your recipes I’ve tried has been a hit! Oh I handed the recipe for one person and used buttermilk
I made these using less milk then recipe calls for as they would have been thin and runny using 1 and 3/4 cup.I used 1 c 1/4 c and 1/8 c and that was the rite consisty I was looking for.the baking soda gave them a tangy taste so I will leave that out if I use this recipe again, I made sure there were no lumps in my baking soda and baking powder, I don’t understand why the baking soda needs to be in the recipe, I think with 4 teaspoons baking powder that is plenty to make them rise, They did cook up beautifully,
I had to throw the whole batch away. I was concerned about the amount of baking soda, but decided to give it the benefit of the doubt. They had a very prevalent baking soda flavor. It’s too bad because they came out nice and fluffy.
Very good recipe!! My grandchildren loved them.
These pancakes were so good!
I will use this recipe again!
Not the best!
Found them quite tough and tasteless.
In all 50 Yrs. cooking I’v never truly made pancakes from scratch.
Waffles or Pancakes ; were dry an not moisty on the waffles , pancakes were dry, not a real butter or flavorful pancakes ! so I resort to box products.
ya ! it’s cheeting but it’s what I did.