Four Superb Spring Pancakes

As I did in the fall and winter, I recently prepared pancakes with seasonal flair. My spring flavors were lemon poppy seed, carrot, apricot almond, and strawberry.

When preparing pancakes like these, I’ve been turning to a shortcut: Krusteaz Complete Pancake Mix. Though I prefer making pancakes from scratch, this shortcut allows me to get breakfast or lunch on the table for my family with less stress.

I made all four of these pancake varieties for a single meal. I assigned a letter to each so that my kids and my parents (who happened to be in town) could rank the flavors. You can see their rankings below the recipes.  

Superb spring pancake recipes

Prepare all the varieties using the following approach:

1. Heat a pancake griddle or pan to 375°F (medium heat).
2. Place the pancake mix and other ingredients in a medium bowl. Whisk together.
3. Lightly grease the hot griddle or pan. Pour approximately ¼ cup batter onto the griddle or pan for each pancake. Cook 1 to 1 ½ minutes per side. Flip each pancake only once, after the top of the pancake bubbles and the bottom is golden brown.
4. Serve with your preferred topping(s). Each recipe yields about a dozen 4-inch pancakes.

Lemon poppy seed pancakes

• 2 cups pancake mix
• 2 tablespoons sugar
• 1 ¼ cups milk
• 1 tablespoon lemon zest
• 2 tablespoons lemon juice
• 1 tablespoon poppy seeds
• 1 ½ teaspoons lemon extract
• ½ teaspoon vanilla extract

Carrot pancakes

• 2 cups pancake mix
• ¼ cup brown sugar
• 1 cup water
• ⅔ cup pureed carrot
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon ground ginger
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 teaspoon orange extract

Apricot almond pancakes

• 3 cups pancake mix
• ¼ cup brown sugar
• 1 cup water
• ⅔ cup pureed or mashed apricot
• ¼ cup sliced almonds
• 1 teaspoon almond extract
• ½ teaspoon vanilla extract

Strawberry pancakes

• 2 ½ cups pancake mix
• 2 tablespoons sugar
• ¾ cup water
• ½ cup sour cream
• ⅔ cup pureed or mashed strawberries
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Notes

Here’s how my oldest kids and their grandparents ranked these spring pancakes:

I thought these were all great! I love lemon, so the lemon poppy seed pancakes were my favorite. However, I would be happy eating any of these. The strawberry pancakes were my second favorite, followed by the carrot. The apricot were fine, but had a very mild taste—it was difficult to tell their flavor was apricot because it didn’t stand out.

I will be looking back at this post in order to prepare some of these again soon! What flavors of pancakes do you enjoy eating during the spring?