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Make these fluffy sourdough pancakes using your sourdough starter discard and a few common ingredients you’re sure to have on hand. You can make the batter the night before and pop into the fridge for quick easy pancakes in the morning, with all the benefits of long fermentation (the flavor and texture of long fermented sourdough pancakes is definitely one to try). They are also perfect to mix and cook right away too if you need a pancakes fast!
My kids LOVE fluffy pancakes so these are a regular meal at our house (it’s totally acceptable to serve sourdough pancakes for dinner sometimes in my house). While I don’t necessarily need to discard in order to maintain my mature sourdough starter, I feed it a little extra to make sure I am able to make these whenever the need arises (and I always have a jar of this homemade sourdough pancake mix on my counter too). If you are still making a sourdough starter, you will need to discard regularly to ensure your starter thrives (read more about why you must discard sourdough starter).
Why you’ll love this recipe!
You’ll love this discard recipe because you can make these overnight long fermented or mix and cook straight away. I love making them the night before and allowing them to ferment a little before we cook them for breakfast. It’s an easy way to get some of the good stuff into my growing boys, served alongside these sourdough scrambled eggs.
Ingredients
- Sourdough Starter – you can use sourdough discard or active starter, it’s really up to you. I just use whatever I have on hand! Check out my instruction for how to make a sourdough starter.
- All Purpose Flour – you can sub up to 100 g whole wheat flour. If you want to use more whole wheat flour than this, I recommend these whole wheat sourdough pancakes.
- Whole Milk – use any type of milk you prefer, even non dairy milk will work in this recipe. If you have a lot of buttermilk on hand from making homemade butter or cultured butter, this is a perfect substitute too.
- Butter – you’ll need melted butter, I’ve used salted as always, but feel free to use unsalted butter if you prefer.
- Granulated Sugar
- Egg
- Baking Powder – not baking soda.
- Salt – just a pinch, leave it out if you really want to (I add salt to pretty much everything)
- Vanilla Extract
How To Make Sourdough Discard Pancakes
Pancakes are one of the easiest sourdough discard recipes out there! You can choose to make giant pancakes, regular sized or even mini pancakes (these are perfect for packed lunches).
Add the sourdough starter, milk, egg, butter, vanilla and sugar to a large bowl. Whisk well until just combined.
Now add the remaining ingredients (all purpose flour, baking powder and salt) to the liquid ingredients and whisk until a batter forms. This batter is ready to use straight away, but can be fermented overnight in the refrigerator if you want to (I’ve added notes for this in the recipe card at the bottom of this post).
You can cook your homemade pancakes in a large frying pan or skillet.
Kate’s Pro Tip
The Bubbliest Sourdough Pancakes!
Let all the bubbles fully form on the surface before you flip them over. Medium-low heat is best as it lets the bubbles develop without burning the outside.
Oven Baked Sourdough Discard Pancakes
If we are really in a hurry in the morning, I sometimes oven bake our pancakes. You’ll find the full instructions for sourdough discard sheet pan pancakes here. I place a sheet of parchment paper into a shallow tray or roasting pan and then pour the pancake batter into it.
If I have time I’ll sprinkle some frozen berries and shredded coconut on the top. But they are great plain too.
I bake in a moderate oven for around 15 to 30 minutes. The batter is very forgiving so it’s hard to muck them up! This method works whether you make the batter and bake immediately or make the batter the night before. Once baked, I just cut them into squares and the kids love them! They cook up nice and fluffy.
Our Favorite Toppings
Breakfast is a big deal in our house! Along with sourdough pancakes, we also love sourdough waffles, sourdough crepes and this sourdough Dutch baby pancake. And all of these things need toppings, right! Here are our favorite toppings for sourdough pancakes:
- Freshly whipped cream and berries are always welcome, but if you want to add frozen berries to the actual pancakes, add them just before you flip the pancakes. Raspberries and blueberries work really well in this manner.
- Fancy butter – For something extra indulgent, we love our sourdough pancakes topped with whipped maple butter, whipped honey cinnamon butter or this whipped brown butter! These butters all work really well on sourdough bread too!
- Ice cream – to make these sourdough pancakes extra special, add a big scoop of your favorite ice cream on top.
How To Store + Freeze
Fridge – These pancakes are suitable to cook the day before and store in the fridge. You can microwave them in the morning for a quick and easy breakfast.
Freeze – You can freeze the cooked pancakes. Wait until they are cool and then freeze with pieces of parchment paper in between so they don’t stick together. A ziplock bag is perfect for this.
Frequently Asked Questions
If you have a Thermomix, these sourdough discard pancakes are even easier to make. You can place all the ingredients into the bowl at the same time. Mix on speed 4 for about a minute and voila – easiest Thermomix sourdough discard pancakes ever!
Sourdough pancakes do have a more complex flavor than regular pancakes. You can taste the sourdough discard for sure. You will get a more pronounced sourdough flavor if you ferment the pancake batter in the fridge overnight.
Sourdough Discard Pancakes
Equipment
- Mixing Bowl
- Frying Pan
Ingredients
- 100 g Sourdough starter discard
- 200 g All Purpose Flour, you can sub up to 100g whole wheat flour
- 200 g Milk, you can sub with buttermilk if you'd like (see notes)
- 50 g Butter, Melted
- 40 g Sugar
- 1 Egg
- 8 g Baking Powder
- 3 g Salt, (a pinch of salt)
- 5 g Vanilla Extract
Instructions
- Add the sourdough starter, milk, egg, butter, vanilla and sugar to a bowl. Whisk well until just combined.
- Now add the flour, baking powder and salt to the liquid ingredients and whisk until well combined and a batter forms.
- This batter is ready to use straight away (see notes below if you want to ferment the batter overnight).
- Heat a large frying pan and add a little oil and butter to grease it. Cook the pancakes to your desired size (use a mini soup ladle to scoop out the mixture). Let all the bubbles fully form on the surface before you flip them over. A lower heat is better as it lets the bubbles develop without burning the outside.
Notes
- Add the Sourdough Starter, sugar, milk and flour together in a bowl and mix until well combined. Leave it on the counter overnight (it’s perfectly safe to leave the milk overnight, however if you’re worried it can go in the fridge for up to 24 hours).
- In the morning, add eggs, baking powder, melted butter, salt and vanilla essence and mix well until it forms a batter.
- The batter made this way will be quite stretchy because of the overnight fermentation of the flour.
- Cook as instructed in the regular recipe above.
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
Like this? Rate and comment below!
I have made so many different pancake recipes over the years and these are by far my favourite. So easy to make and an absolutely brilliant use of discard. Thanks you! These will be on repeat for sure.
I made these this morning and they were so delicious! I love thick pancakes and these fit the bill. I also love pancakes with flavor and these have just the perfect amount. Thank you for a delicious breakfast!!
I’m relatively new to sourdough and my ONLY go to for everything sourdough is Pantry Mama! I recently made this recipe for my adult kids and their spouses and truth be told, I cannot even remember the last time I made pancakes. (my syrup confirmed this with expiration far past the use by date) There were 8 of us, so I made two batches, (one with chocolate chips, and the other as is) I didn’t have the best pans for cooking them and used my new cooktop stove as well. The cook results were varied, due to my rusting pancake flipping, but the reviews were sensational. I was repeatedly told how good these were and one pancake aficionado said they were one of the best she’s ever had. I will definitely make them again knowing how well they were received.
Love to hear that, Christy! They’re one of our favorites too. 🙂 Thank you so much for your review.