What Makes This Recipe So Good
Jack-o-lantern pancakes taste better than regular pancakes. It’s true! Don’t ask me how it works, but somehow, taking regular pancake batter, making it bright orange and bright green, and then shaping it into a pumpkin makes it taste 100x better than just… making a pancake. And then you put chocolate chips in it?! Magic. This recipe is almost as much fun to make as it is to eat! Jack-o-lantern pancakes are SUPER easy, and you can totally get your kids to help you out in the kitchen with this one. Good food AND good memories! They fully embrace the spoopy season. If you’ve never heard that term before, then allow me to introduce you. “Spoopy” is fairly common around social media this time of year, for the last few years. According to Merriam-Webster, the technical definition is “amusing internet slang describing cute, comical, or silly versions of typically spooky subject matter such as ghosts and skeletons”. So bright orange jack-o-lantern pancakes with chocolate chip eyes and teeth? Totally spoopy.
Key Ingredients
Pancake Batter – The great thing about this recipe is that it’s 100% customizable. The type of pancake mix (or recipe) you use is up to you. Your jack-o-lantern pancakes could be gluten free, dairy free, vegan, keto, low carb, paleo, fluffy and thick, crisp and thin – whatever you like!Food Coloring – For a super vibrant color without using a ton of food coloring, use gel or gel paste colors. They’re thicker and more concentrated than the regular liquid ones, so you get a better color with less work.Chocolate Chips – You’ve probably had chocolate chips mixed into your pancake batter before. Delicious, right?! Well, I’m giving you permission to play with your food right now, so instead of mixing them straight into the batter, we’ll be using chocolate chips to make our jack-o-lantern pancake face! Use whatever you like best – dark chocolate, semi-sweet, or milk chocolate all work.Note: To make this recipe even more festive and seasonal, add a little pumpkin pie spice to the pancake batter! If you don’t like the taste of pumpkin, don’t worry – there’s no pumpkin in it. Pumpkin pie spice is generally a blend of cinnamon, allspice, ginger, clove, and nutmeg.
Chef’s Tips
A little tip for filling your sandwich bag with batter! Grab a cup (like a plastic drinking cup) out of the cabinet or wherever you keep them. Take your plastic sandwich bag. Put your hand in the bag, into one of the bottom corners. Now, stick that corner (with your hand still in the bag) in the cup. Use your other hand to fold the top of the plastic bag down around the edge of the cup (the inside of the top of the bag will face out now). Take your hand out of the bag. Voila! Now you can transfer batter right into the bag! The cup will hold the sandwich bag up and open so you’re not fumbling with it or making a huge mess. When you’ve got all the jack o lantern pancake batter you need in the bag, just unfold the top of the bag from around the cup’s edge, twist it closed, and snip the bottom corner off so you have an opening for piping. If you want to get more precise (or artistic) with your jack-o-lantern shapes, use squeeze bottles! Like those plastic ketchup and mustard bottles. They’ll give you a little more control than a cookie scoop or a plastic bag/piping bag. Make sure the jack-o-lantern pancakes are mostly cooked through on the first side before you flip them over. If the second side cooks for too long, the jack-o-lantern face will be brown instead of orange and you’ll probably have a melty mess instead of facial features.
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