These tender Gluten-Free Quinoa Almond Flour Pancakes are perfect when you’re craving comfort food but want something a little bit healthy.
I’m always trying to sneak in healthy ingredients for my kids, so on one recent snow day, I whipped up these Quinoa Almond Pancakes for breakfast. I had cooked quinoa from the night before (I always make extra cooked grains so I can throw them into whatever I think of) so making these pancakes was easy.
My kids are not big fans of quinoa. They just don’t like the texture or the taste, so I pureed the quinoa and pancake ingredients in a blender until it was nice and smooth.
These are tender pancakes and a real treat when you’ve got a hankering for something special for breakfast – a great way to fill up your tummy with all sorts of goodness. Top with some fresh berries or caramelized bananas for something extra special.
I had a little fun learning how to make this gif for you all. Cool right?! Have a great day and remember…Choose To Be Happy!
Quinoa Almond Flour Pancakes
Ingredients
- 1 cup cooked white quinoa 4.7 ounces
- 1 cup almond flour 1.9 ounces - I used Honeyville
- 4 tablespoons coconut oil
- 2 eggs
- 1/2-1 cup almond milk depending on consistency desired
- 4 teaspoons baking powder
- 2 tablespoons maple syrup
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
Instructions
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Place all ingredients in a blender and blend until smooth. Lightly grease skillet with coconut oil and pour batter into skillet (~ 1/4 cup for each pancake). Cook until browned on bottom; flip and cook other side until browned.
You might also like these quinoa recipes:
Quinoa Banana Chocolate Chip Breakast Bake
Gluten Free Fruit and Nut Snack Bars {Nature Valley $500 Gift Card Sweepstakes}
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I love how much health there is in these and yet how fluffy they are! You would never know there’s so much goodness packed into them!
Thanks Joanne – these are really nice and tender. My boys had no idea they were eating quinoa LOL!
Perfection! I love this quinoa and almond flour pancake recipe, Jeanette! You’re such a sneaky mom. 😉 Love the gif, too. Thanks for sharing, girl. Pinning tonight!
Thanks Stacy – I am pretty sneak aren’t I ;). I just have to hide the ingredients so the boys don’t see what I’m using when they come around the kitchen.
YES please! LOVE!!
Love that syrup drizzle at the end, makes me want to dive right in!
I love that you made quinoa pancakes – such a healthy and awesome idea! Hehe, and I love how sneaky you are too – I have to do the same with my lil guy and hubby – I’ve tried making pancakes using oats and coconut flour and can’t wait to try using quinoa next. Great recipe, thanks for sharing and love that gif!
The proportions for milk were way off. I got an almost watery texture. I had to add an additional cup of flour to thicken. Is there a typo?
Hi Holly, thanks for trying the recipe and letting me know what happened. My pancakes turned out fine with these proportions, but the difference between your results and mine might be due to differences in the moisture content of the cooked quinoa (how wet or dry your cooked quinoa is) and the density of the almond flour (some brands are lighter than others, e.g., I’ve found big variances in the density of Trader Joe’s vs. Honeyville’s almond flour). My quinoa was on the dryer side (like a pilaf), and I used Honeyville almond flour. You got my curiosity going, so I just made two more batches, one using half a cup of milk in one batch and another with one cup of milk. They both worked (the one with 1 cup milk was pourable; the one with 1/2 cup milk was much thicker so I used a 1/4 cup measuring up to scoop it out), The ones I made with less milk, although fluffier, were drier and fell apart. I’ve modified the recipe to include weights for the cooked quinoa and almond flour, and suggest that anyone making this recipe start with less milk and mix in more to get the right consistency (semi-thick batter). As noted in the recipe, this is a delicate pancake, so it also helps to make sure the pancake is cooked well on one side before flipping it. Now, I am stuffed with pancakes ;).
These sound great.
Question though: the 4 TBSP of coconut oil, does that go in the batter/blender as well or is that just for the pan?
Thanks!
Allison – the coconut oil goes right into the blender with all the other batter ingredients. Start with 1/2 cup milk and check the consistency of the batter – it should be relatively thick but pourable. If it’s too thick, add a little more milk. As noted in the recipe, depending on how dry/wet your cooked quinoa is and the brand of almond flour you use, the amount of liquid needed varies.
Gorgeous Jeanette!!!! I used to make pancakes like these. Pinned and bookmarked.
Thanks so much Adrienne!
Jeanette,
Can coconut milk be used instead of almond milk?
Traci – yes coconut milk (or any other milk) should work in place of almond milk.
Good to know! I was using Bob’s Red Mill almond flour, and it is very fine and light. I ended up with a huge batch, but my toddler is enjoying them breakfast after breakfast!
I learned this when I made a different almond pancake recipe and ran out of one brand and switched to another. The batter was entirely different. Now, I try to weigh my almond flour to make sure the volume is consistent. With gluten-free flours, weighing them out if possible is the best option as different flours have different densities.
I absolutely love this recipe and can’t wait to give it a try. I’ve been trying to make my baking healthy as well. Thank you for this recipe.Please check my blog full of heels and buns 🙂 http://www.heelsandbuns.com
x
K
Thanks Ksenija, always challenging but fun when baking healthier, so it’s so rewarding when you end up with something that works and everyone enjoys 😉
I’m so incredibly excited that I came across your blog today. This recipe is just one of many of your’s that I’ve added to my ZipList recipe box.
These – Oh boy! I want them now!
Have you worked with Quinoa flour before?
I’ve used quinoa flour in cookies, but haven’t tried them in pancakes yet.
Love finding this recipe, since I cut out white flour in my diet. I also love that you use maple syrup, instead of sugar in the recipe. Your pancake recipe sounds amazing! Hugs, Terra
Thanks Terra – I’m always experimenting with different ways to make healthier pancakes 😉
First time visitor to your site and recipes. I made the pancakes. They were the most delicious I’ve ever made. Thank you so much for sharing. I love the quinoa in them.
Chris, thanks so much for letting me know you tried this recipe and enjoyed it! I was really happy that I could sneak quinoa into these pancakes 😉
Chris – so glad you tried these pancakes and loved them! Thanks so much for stopping back to let me know how they turned out. I always enjoy hearing from folks who try my recipes.
Just made these and although the flavor was DELIGHTFUL, they were way too delicate, and therefore I did not end up with any “pancakes”. They completely fell apart when I tried to very gently flip them. Bummer! Could be that I don’t use a nonstick pan? I’ve made several pancake recipes over the past couple weeks, however, with this my same pan and haven’t had any trouble. I wanted to mention this in case anyone with only regular (stainless steel) pans considers attempting these.
Lucy – yes I did use a non-stick pan. These are very delicate pancakes, so they need to be flipped very gently. The batter might need to be thicker or sturdier and more oil would probably be needed if made in a stainless steel pan. A seasoned cast iron pan might work better.
Fantastic recipe. I didn’t have coconut oil so I used walnut oil, nor did I have almond flour so I used Trader Joes Italian chestnut flour (gluten free). It came out delicious!
Robin – so glad you tried this recipe and it turned out well for you. Thanks for sharing the substitutions you made!
Was just wondering how these would freeze or if anyone has tried to freeze? I am so tired of oatmeal every morning and wanted to change it up by making a week long stash of these and freezing and taking out each morning. Thanks!
Debi – I haven’t tried freezing these, although I would imagine they should freeze fine since they sell frozen pancakes. I would just wrap them well in batches.
Amazing!!! These were super delicious (plus they didn’t leave the kitchen a disaster). I just put my blender jar right on the scale and weighed the almond flour & quinoa right into it… Added the rest of the ingredients and blended it right up into the perfect consistency. Best of all, I feel good about what just went into my body vs. typical “pancake guilt” ;]
Will definitely make again!
Kelly – so glad you tried this recipe and enjoyed it. Thank you so much for coming back to let me know how they turned out. I love hearing from readers who try my recipes.
OMG! I made these this morning and I am in love! I could not believe how good they were. I will never make regular pancakes again. I served them with warm syrup and fresh strawberries. Heaven!
Denise – so glad you enjoyed these!
Hi there,
Love your idea for the pancakes bit you have a problem with almond flour.1.9ounces of almond meal is not equal to 1 cup.it’s 59 grams.A cup is 140gr.about.Please check amounts.Let us know.Love pancakes.also cut down on the oil and syrup using ripe banana.Luckily I was able to save the batter,.yum
Hi Debs, the amount of almond flour needed depends on the type/brand. I’ve found some almond flour is denser or lighter than others. I used Honeyville which I think is denser than other brands such as Trader Joe’s. I’d love to hear which almond flour you used. Thanks for your feedback and glad you were able to make these work for you as well as make them even healthier. Love the idea of using banana to cut down on the amount of oil and syrup.
Hi,
I made these with ground almonds from the bulk food store and I used cows milk. They are fragile but not unmanageable and they tasted great. Very filling. I put the leftover batter in the fridge overnight so we had them for two days. I made blueberry syrup to go with them. Yum!
So glad you tried this recipe and enjoyed them. They are a bit fragile so flipping them has to be done gently.
These are so dang good! Hubby and I gave up traditional pancakes (gluten) which is fine cuz these are waaay better!!!! Thanks!!
Jess – so glad these turned out for you and your hubby! Thanks so much for letting me know.
Do these have a crunch to them at all or a similar texture to regular pancakes? Just made another recipe for almond flour pancakes and they were crunchy and I couldn’t handle the texture.
Danielle – these do not have any crunch to them because the batter is completely blended in the blender.
Where’s the nutrition info?
Maria, I don’t usually calculate nutrition information for my recipes, but I went back and did it for you. It’s in the post now beneath the recipe. Note the recipe assumes 8 servings or 2 pancakes.
Made these exactly as recipe and they were delicious. The secret like you stated was to let them cook all the way before gently turning them over. Thank you so much for the awesome recipe. I was out of vanilla extract but had almond. They were just delicious. Again, many thanks…
Bev – thanks so much for trying this recipe and for your feedback!
these were so good. I’m currently on a strict candida diet so I used coconut milk instead of almond and omitted the sweetener all together. i also topped them with toasted coconut and almond butter. best thing I’ve eaten in weeks. thanks so much!
Wendy, so glad you were able to modify this recipe to meet your needs – thanks for telling us what you used to make it work for the candida diet.
I tried these yesterday and my husband and I really enjoyed them! GREAT recipe! I was really happy I doubled the batch because they were great heated up today. I plopped some greek yogurt on top and YUM!
So glad you and your husband enjoyed this recipe – thanks so much for coming back to let me know. Glad they reheated well too. Great idea topping with Greek yogurt!
I am making these, I only have coconut flour, I will let know how they turn out!
Amanda – coconut flour works differently from almond flour – usually you have to use a lot more eggs. Look forward to hearing how your pancakes turn out.
Wow! These are the bomb-diggity! They’re hearty but delicate and oh-so-yummy! What a great recipe for a treat without all the guilt. And as a bonus, the recipe is really easy with not too many ingredients or steps. My pancakes came out beautifully. Thank you so much!
Lisa – thanks so much for trying this recipe and for your feedback. So glad to hear they turned out great for you!
Thanks for your recipe. How do you think they will store over night? I am always in a hurry in the morning so would be good to have them made and re-heat or eat cold the next day.
I’ve never tried storing these overnight, but I’m guessing they can be reheated briefly the next day like most pancakes.
Just made theae. DELICIOUS!!!!
Thank you for trying my recipe and for letting me know how they turned out – so glad you enjoyed them!
Looks amazing! Have you tried an egg substitute for these, if not do you think a flax egg would work? Thanks.
Hi Jennifer, I have not tried egg substitute in this recipe before; however I have tried flax egg in muffins as an egg substitute and it has worked. I’d love to hear if you try it in these pancakes.
Wow! I made these this morning using some leftover quinoa/rice/sprouted mung bean blend! I used a no sugar added vanilla almond milk, also, as it’s all I have on hand. All of the other ingredients I used as written! Wow, again! Probably some of the best tasting gluten free pancakes I’ve had since I started eating gluten free almost 5 years ago! And it is a great way to use up that leftover quinoa from dinner the night before (we always make extra). I cooked then on my griddle between 325-350 and found that if you let them cook until they are dry on top and steam is no longer coming from them that they will flip with much more success. I used the entire cup of almond milk, the consistency was not quite pourable, I used a 1/4 cup measure to scoop and pour onto the griddle. I thought they were easy, perfect, and I love how the edges got crispy! Mmmmmmm!
Hi Julie – so glad you ejoyed these pancakes and I love that you used a blend of gains/legumes. Thanks so much for sharing your alterations!
I like that you made quinoa – a healthy and wonderful idea! Hehe, and I also like your stealth. Great recipe, thanks for sharing