Mini pancake bites are a simple way to make sure that you enjoy the most important meal of the day. Freezer friendly and ready in about 30 minutes, these are great for busy mornings of for simple snacks.
Breakfast is the best meal of the day. Screw most important because I don’t care about that. But it is the tastiest, most satisfying, and delicious thing in the world. In my opinion, it’s even better than dessert….and this is a baking blog.
My passion for breakfast is so great that I can’t understand how many of you skip breakfast because you’re “too busy”. Girl, I’ve gotten up at 2 am before leaving for the airport at 3:30am just to ensure that I had enough time for a good breakfast. When I used to work stock shifts at Target (which sometimes started as early as 5am), I’d have breakfast at home and then second breakfast on my first break.
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Jump to RecipeHow do you skip the most wonderful part of your day?! Anyways, now you’ll have absolutely zero excuse to skip breakfast with these easy, delicious and freezer-friendly mini pancake bites.
You’ll love these because they make making time for breakfast easy and delicious. Light and fluffy, without being too sweet they’re the perfect quick bite recipe for busy weeks.
What you’ll need
Mini Muffin Tin: This is the one I have and it’s perfect for all the mini desserts and treats that I bake. This recipe makes 40 mini bites so this 48 cup mini tin means you’ll only have to bake once. Yay.
Toppings…lots and lots of toppings. For my own pancake bites we chose chocolate chips, strawberries and blueberries, bananas, chocolate chips, and sprinkles.
Some Tips and Tricks…
- We can change this recipe a bit to make it fit your life style better. For example, if you’re feeling healthy, add 1/4 cup of your favorite protein powder.
Or for an egg free version, replace your 2 eggs with 2/3 cup of applesauce. So good! (Also, make your own simple applesauce here for an extra healthy treat).
- Paint your mini muffin tin with melted butter. A little pastry brush does wonders to cover the pan well. A well covered pan means mini pancakes come out whole, not a crumbly mess. These are pancake BITES so you don’t want to leave half your already small amount behind.
You can use a non-stick spray but I tend to prefer using butter, for you know, the health factor. (And tbh, I’m cheap and refuse to pay for non-stick spray, because why would I need to when I have butter at home)?
- Depending how many chocolate chips you put in your batter, flipping the pan over to take them out may just be unnecessarily messy….warm chocolate and all. SO! Instead, use a butter knife to loosen and life the pancakes out of the pan. If you buttered the pan well, this works perfectly.
- Now, these bites are pretty great by themselves. They’re soft, moist, and nice and fluffy. BUT! Sometimes freezer things dry out in the microwave. We all know this. So, having some dippings and/or toppings is nice.
Obviously, you can use the typical maple syrup but I’m here to give you some more creative ideas too.
Try These Alternative Dippings + Toppings for Your Pancake Bites
- Lemon Curd
- Jam
- Whipped Cream and More Fresh Berries
- Cinnamon
- Honey
- Applesauce
- Yogurt
- Powdered Sugar
- Peanut Butter
- Chocolate Syrup
- Pie Filling
- Caramel Sauce – Get a small batch recipe of some amazing caramel sauce from our free cookbook.
- And of course, you can heat up your frozen bites and spread some yummy butter on top for absolute perfection.
We Like Fluffy Pancake Bites.
How do we achieve the fluff? Fluff is essentially what makes any baked good amazing. Without fluff, bakers have no order. And there’s nothing better than fluffy pancakes on a Saturday morning.
So the question we must ask is what is fluff and how do we create it? Fluff is quite simple. When we add air into our batter, that air tries to escape during the baking process. Because gasses rise under heated conditions. However, it’s stuck in your batter creating air pocket holes: aka, fluff.
So essentially, fluffiness is created from the air carving out a small shelter to ride out the heat wave in.
Many things help create those air pockets in pancakes. Leaveners such as baking powder do it by causing a fizzing chemical reaction that releases CO2 bubbles.
Let the batter sit. Batter sitting means the baking powder will begin to react and start leavening. This means this will make your mini pancake bites fluffy and light.
Leave your batter lumpy. A few lumps creates your more space for air pockets. Air pockets mean fluffier. Leave the lumps. Lumps are good.
WE LIKE THESE BITES BEING FLUFFY!….obviously.
Mini Pancake Bites
Ingredients
- 1½ cup flour
- 3 tsp baking powder
- 1 cup sugar
- ½ tsp vanilla extract
- ¼ tsp salt
- 1½ cup milk
- 2 large eggs
- 4 tbsp butter melted
- 1 tsp cinnamon
- Toppings
Instructions
- Preheat your oven to 350°F and grease your mini muffin tin well. Chop any large toppings (like berries or fruit) and set aside.
- Sift your dry ingredients together in a large mixing bowl and mix them well.
- Combine your softened butter, milk, vanilla, and eggs. Beat until just combined and then add your dry ingredients. Again mix until just combined. Do NOT overmix. You want a few lumps in your batter. Then add your cinnamon and whisk it in just a bit.
- Allow your batter to sit for about 10 minutes to rise slightly. Then fill each mini muffin cup ⅔ of the way full.
- Bake for 12 minutes. Allow to cool for about 10 minutes in the pan before flipping it over to remove your bites.
- Dip your pancake bites in lemon curd, maple syrup, top with whipped cream or more fresh berries. Store extras in an airtight container in the fridge for up to a week or in the freezer for up to two months.
Video
Notes
Nutrition
Final Notes…
I think we can definitely agree that breakfast is amazing at any time of day. Mini pancake bites are a snackable, fast breakfast treats that are worth making. I love making a batch maybe once a month (or twice…or thrice, depending on my snacking habit for the month).
It’s a super simple freezer meal to make and is still way healthier than Eggo waffles and such. If you “don’t have time for breaky”, this next Sunday I challenge you to bake these and enjoy them for breakfast. I’m not saying that it’s completely life changing, but it’s worth a shot, right?
And once you’ve made these easy peasy mini pancake bites, take a pic, post it on the gram and make sure to tag me (@handheld_eats)! I love seeing you creations and really, if you don’t post it on Instagram, did it even happen?
