Fluffy Pancakes - the Softest and Fluffiest Pancake Recipe - Quick, Easy and 5-miniute Prep. (2024)

FAQs

What is the trick to fluffy pancakes? ›

The combination of homemade buttermilk (milk and vinegar) and two leaveners (baking powder and baking soda) create lots of air bubbles in the pancake batter, resulting in the lightest and fluffiest pancakes imaginable.

Milk helps make pancakes fluffier than water. Since milk is thicker than water, it creates a thicker batter. Further, if you use whole milk or low fat milk, the fat content helps yield tender, fluffy results.

Pancakes and waffles typically both contain baking soda, which causes them to rise. As soon as the baking soda is combined with the wet ingredients (which contain an acidic ingredient, like often buttermilk), it starts producing carbon dioxide gas bubbles that cause the batter to rise.

Pancake lovers' biggest complaint when adding water instead of milk is that the flavor seems to change. Pancakes aren't as richly flavored with water. There are a few ways to improve your batter when you've used water, including: Add extra butter.

The natural chemical leavening agent we'll be using is baking soda. This helps pancakes rise up while being fluffy and soft. Baking soda is a base with a high alkaline. When it mixes with an acid or in this case, the buttermilk, it creates bubbles that release a lot of gas.

Add Dairy for Richness

Milk, yogurt, melted butter, and ricotta cheese are just a few dairy products that can alter a box mix pancake's structure, yielding a pancake that's both fluffy and moist. If your pancake mix simply calls for water, substitute the same amount of milk and enjoy an airier texture.

Add an Egg

Even if your pancake mix doesn't call for an egg, mix one into the batter. The egg will add richness to the recipe and make the end result taste like homemade pancakes. If your pancake mix already calls for an egg, try adding an extra one.

Using Baking Soda vs.

If your boxed mix doesn't already call for it, you can also add in a few eggs. The addition of the egg in your mix will give your batter a better texture, as well as more flavor. These pancakes will taste like you just ordered them from your favorite breakfast spot, but right at home!

Baking powder, like baking soda, is a chemical leavening agent made with sodium bicarbonate (aka baking soda) plus a weak acid, such as potassium bitartrate. Baking soda is essential for baked goods, but baking powder is really what makes pancakes and biscuits rise and become so super fluffy.

What is the most important ingredient in pancakes? ›

Flour is the main ingredient to any pancake. It provides the structure. Different types of flours alter the structure because some flours absorb more moisture or create more gluten (which binds the structure together) than others.

Add a little baking powder to mix and prepare as usual. The baking powder will make them light and fluffy. You can make the batter slightly thinner than the recipe on the box recommends (add a little more water, milk, or buttermilk). Then, add a pinch of additional baking powder to the mix, and cook normally.

Too much egg, however, will make the pancake dense and custard-like; not enough will make it drier and more biscuit-like. Baking powder and baking soda are the chemical leaveners typically used in pancakes. They are responsible for the bubbles in the batter, and for making the cakes light and fluffy.

Adding lots more eggs would start to move you into custard or quiche-like territory, where the product would have a lot more egg flavor, and start to take on a more scrambled-egg type texture depending on how far you go. You will get less flavor but more textural change from using just whites.

How you handle the batter makes a difference. If you beat it until it is smooth, your pancakes won't be as fluffy. Pancake batter should be mixed until it still has a few lumps in it. Then it needs to stand for about 15 minutes, to ensure that the flour is fully hydrated.