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I couldn’t wait to start getting my Christmas decorations up early this year. I fully admit to being one of those people who take the Halloween decorations down and immediately take out the Christmas stuff! Anyone else right there with me?? My reasoning is totally related to the fact we always travel out of town to see family over Thanksgiving and Christmas. The time we spend in our own home, enjoying our decorations, is actually pretty minimal. I maximize that time by getting everything out in November, so that it doesn’t feel like I’m taking it all back down only two or three weeks later.
We’ve been lighting up our tree every night and enjoying the ambiance, but that doesn’t mean I’m completely over all the Fall things! I’ve been in the kitchen using up my stash of homemade pumpkin puree to whip up all things pumpkin spice, and today I have an amazing Pumpkin Pancake recipe to share with you. I started making vegan pancakes on the regular, back when I learned hubs was allergic to dairy and realized one of our daughters is allergic to dairy as well as egg. I also have to admit, I love eating plant-based as much as possible. I’ve perfected the recipe over the years and can promise you – you won’t even notice egg and dairy are missing!
Fluffy Vegan Pumpkin Pancakes are ULTRA thick and fluffy, and super delicious! Dairy happens to be one of the most inflammatory foods out there and while you won’t notice any difference in flavor in this recipe, you will notice you don’t feel overstuffed and weighed down. Another essential ingredient for feeling good, is using sprouted whole wheat flour. If you haven’t tried it yet, I sure hope you do! Sprouted flour is easier to digest, higher in several nutrients and totally worth the swap.* When you click on my favorite product links, I may earn a tiny commission from qualifying purchases, at no cost to you. Thank you for supporting Big Little Bites blog*
I have a couple of tricks up my sleeve for substituting egg and dairy in pancake recipes, that never fail me. The best part is, these tricks lead to the fluffiest pancakes EVER! Keep reading to learn more!
For pancakes to be vegan, the egg, milk and butter all need to be avoided. Instead of cutting out one or all of these ingredients completely, I simply substitute them with alternatives that result in the fluffiest pancakes around!
I replace eggs with “flax eggs.” If you’ve never made a flax egg before don’t be intimidated – it’s easy and is an excellent egg replacer in any baking recipe that calls for 1 or 2 eggs. You’ll only need ground flax seed (the one I linked is my favorite, and one bag of it lasts forever in my fridge!) and water. Scroll down for easy directions on how to make flax eggs.
Another secret to ultra-fluffy pancakes, is the addition of vegan yogurt! I’ve linked my favorite clean-ingredient one to use, and I always make sure to buy the “unsweetened.” I love that this recipe uses minimal sugar and that the pancakes are only sweetened by applesauce and coconut sugar, which is low on the glycemic index.
In a small ramekin or bowl, stir together flax seed and water. Leave undisturbed for at least 10 minutes before using in a recipe. The mixture will be thickened and resemble the consistency of egg white.
The bowl on the left shows the pumpkin puree and flax eggs being stirred together. The bowl on the right, shows all of the ingredients mixed together.
Once everything is mixed together, I heat my griddle to 325 degrees and grease it with a smear of coconut oil just before I’m ready to cook. I use a 1/4 c measurement to scoop batter onto my hot griddle, and flip the pancakes when they appear to be bubbling slightly on top.
While the pancakes are cooking, make the quick candied pecans to top your pancakes with. They don’t take long to come together, and in my opinion, are an essential topping for Fluffy Vegan Pumpkin Pancakes!
But don’t forget the maple syrup! Artificial “pancake syrup” is made mostly of corn syrup and food dye to resemble the real stuff, which is sap from a tree. Real maple syrup is rich in caramelized flavor and provides manganese, zinc and even calcium, among other nutrients and antioxidants. Every Fall, I keep my eyes open at the grocer, for bourbon, barrel-aged maple syrup – it’s one of my favorite flavor finds and the packaging is usually so chic! I also think a bottle of bourbon barrel-aged maple syrup makes a really great, unique and special holiday gift for all of the important service people in our lives. Imagine surprising your postman with a beautiful bottle tagged with a thank you note, inside your mailbox!
You know how at the grocery store, they have all those meatless meat options? They never actually taste good, and they’re mostly made of overly processed ingredients like soy. Yah, that’s NOT what this is… and it tastes WAY better!
Faux meat at the grocery store is processed, so you really can’t even consider the ingredients to be whole foods. I love doing meatless nights multiple times a week for my family, but I don’t love processed foods and the health risks that come with them. This homemade, 2 ingredient, plant-based, meatless ground beef will blow your mind. Made of just minced walnuts and cauliflower, the resulting texture looks and feels like ground beef! With the addition of a few key spices, the flavor is delicious and will have you coming back for seconds. Does it taste just like ground beef? Let’s be honest – no plant-based food can replicate that flavor. BUT! It does taste really good and there’s no weird aftertaste like with some faux meats. All you really end up tasting, is the mixture of spices this healthy, plant-based meatless beef is cooked in, and that fits the bill for me!
The first thing you’ll want to do, is get out your food processor and mince 1.5 cups of walnuts with the chopping blade. Measure out 1 cup of the minced walnut, and place it in a large bowl. Now add an entire head of trimmed cauliflower florets to the food processor. Chop until minced, and measure out 1.5 cups to the bowl with the walnuts. Whatever leftover walnut and cauliflower you have, freeze them separately for later use.
In a separate small bowl or ramekin, stir the shiro miso paste with hot water to thin it out. Add all of the spices, garlic and miso to the large bowl of minced cauliflower and walnuts and stir to combine. If you’re looking for a great chili lime seasoning made from real foods and no “flavors” added, I highly recommend my personal favorite, Trader Joe’s Chili Lime Seasoning. I use it in all of my taco recipes! I always make sure to keep my spice cabinet stocked with it, because it’s that good!
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Once you add the raw meatless beef mixture to a hot skillet with oil, let it cook undisturbed for 5 minutes at a time. The entire cooking process takes 15 minutes, and in between each 5 minute mark, you give it a stir and flip it around. Letting it cook undisturbed, allows the meatless beef to brown slightly; just don’t let it burn and adjust your heat accordingly. I like to cook it over medium-low heat, because it gives me more control. If you want to turn up the heat to move the process along faster, just be sure to keep an eye on the browning, and stir more frequently.
After 15 minutes of cooking the end result will resemble the texture of ground beef, but it will be a little lighter in color. Once I remove meatless beef from the heat, I sprinkle the juice from half a lime and stir the entire plant-based mixture together. The smell of raw cauliflower will be gone and undetectable. Meatless beef does not taste like walnuts or cauliflower, just the delicious flavors you mixed into it.
Prior to serving, I warm up corn tortillas in the oven at 200 degrees for about 5 minutes. I always choose non-GMO (not genetically modified) corn tortillas, and look for brands that use real ingredients without the junk added to it. I avoid genetically modified foods because there is no consensus on the safety and most of the research claiming GMO’s are safe has been performed by biotechnology companies, making it heavily skewed. It’s important to know there have been no epidemiological studies investigating potential effects of GMO food on human health. You can learn more and get facts on the Non-GMO Project website.
My favorite and trusted brands for clean-ingredient corn tortillas are Pinole Blue and Food for Life Ezekiel. Pinole Blue stone-grinds their own corn, and Food for Life uses sprouted corn for more health benefits and easier digestion. Both brands use only real food, non-GMO ingredients.
When you pull the corn tortillas from the oven, immediately shape them gently to hold the meatless beef and toppings. I carefully fold them in half without actually making a crease (which would tear them) and let them cool a bit in that position. Place a scoop of meatless beef in each shell, and top with your desired toppings. I love adding the crunchy texture of chopped purple cabbage, the tang of homemade pickled onions, and plenty of cilantro and avocado.
Summer is a hard season to part with… longer days, warm temperatures, no school routine. But! There’s something about that fresh, crisp Fall air and the leaves changing color that makes me feel all kinds of cozy! I SO look forward to scoping out the Fall fashion trends all Spring and Summer and am such a sucker for all the sweaters and boots!
You know the other thing I’m a sucker for? All things pumpkin spice! I quit drinking coffee before my first pregnancy, so a decaf pumpkin spice latte is an occasional treat. The real magic for me though, is in pumpkin spiced foods! I used to buy canned pumpkin, but during my first pregnancy in 2009, I took a closer look at everything I was putting into my body and the lurking toxins, and thought twice. That’s when I first started making my own pumpkin puree; it’s honestly so easy that I have never looked back. If you still choose to use canned foods, I won’t judge – but homemade pumpkin puree is so easy to do that I recommend trying it at least once! Either way – you’re going to need some pumpkin puree for this deliciously hot, nourishing bowl of Pumpkin Chia Oats.
There’s no better breakfast on a crisp, Fall morning, than a hot bowl of oatmeal to warm you up. Pumpkin Chia Oats amp up the nutrient profile with the addition of chia seeds and pumpkin. Starting the day with protein and healthy fats will get your energy levels up and keep you full until lunch.
Slow-digesting steel cut oats are one of the healthiest ways to start the day. Steel cut oats won’t spike your blood sugar like processed breakfast cereals, and are full of fiber, protein and calcium. You can read more about my personal story with oats, here.
Chia seeds are a great way to add more plant-based protein, healthy fats (plenty of essential omega-3 fatty acids), calcium, phosphorus and zinc to oatmeal. When you mix chia seeds with water, they do this cool thing where they transform into a gel-like mixture that is similar to a pudding or jello texture. On top of the superfood nutrients they add to Pumpkin Chia Oats, they definitely add fluffiness to the bowl as well! I always buy organic chia seeds in bulk when I’m at Costco, but you can also find my favorite brand of Chia Seeds on Amazon!
Cooked pumpkin contains tons of vitamin A and carotenoids, which means its great for your vision! Beta-carotene is also a great antioxidant for cancer prevention because antioxidants through diet, aid your immune system, protecting you from free radicals. This antioxidant is also great for your skin and preventing wrinkles!
Dairy causes inflammation in the gut. Nut milk on the other hand, is anti-inflammatory! Full of healthy unsaturated fatty acids, creamy cashew milk is great for your heart. Cashew milk is also a great source for iron and magnesium – two essential minerals.
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Pumpkin Chia Oatmeal is simple to make! You add the oats, chia seeds, water, cashew milk, vanilla, pumpkin pie spice, applesauce, pumpkin puree and maple syrup to a pot all at once and bring it to a boil. Once it’s boiling, reduce the heat and let it cook for 20 minutes. Just give it a stir every so often, because it’s going to really thicken up and you don’t want it sticking to the bottom of the pan. Add more water as necessary, to thin it out.
The cinnamon sugar pecan topping is essential! I really like my pumpkin spiced foods to have a warm and caramel type taste to them, and treating pecans to a little dip in caramelized sugar with cinnamon is just the right touch!
To start the topping, combine the water, coconut sugar, cinnamon and salt in a small skillet over medium-low heat. The mixture can burn easily, so be careful to avoid that by stirring frequently with a wooden spoon. Once the granules look dissolved enough, you can add in the pecans to coat and toast over the heat. Once finished, the mixture should feel a little tacky when the wooden spoon is stirring.
Assemble your Pumpkin Chia Oats bowl by filling with a cup of chia oats and topping with a tablespoon or two of cinnamon sugar pecan topping!
When our first child, Lola, was two we were so excited to dress her up in costume for what felt like the first Halloween she could participate in. Would we go door to door with a two year old and collect a bunch of candy? It didn’t really feel like it made any sense. At two years old, we were focused on real, whole foods to nourish her developing brain and body, and she didn’t know the difference with junk food anyway. Really, she had the rest of her life to eat candy and her developing toddler years didn’t feel like the right time to start.
We ended up parading her to one or two neighbor homes, for our own fun, before we wound up back home on our front porch passing out candy. Hey, want to know something? Passing out candy was so much more fun! Lola sat on that stoop, eagerly waiting for people to come by. Each time she’d spy kids approaching, she would excitedly whisper to us “the people are coming!” It was so much fun to see everyone’s costumes and Lola thought it was fun to stick candy into everyones bag for them.
Fast forward a few years, to Lola at 5 years old with a couple of little sisters in the mix. She was now old enough to understand and appreciate the fun of trick or treating, but in our opinion, still too young to need to plow through an entire basket of candy. This is when we basically began conversations about moderation with processed and refined foods. We talked (and still do) about how it’s ok to eat these foods once in a while, why we make healthy choices and how to balance it all. I have always found that when we take the time to explain why we set the limits we do, as parents, our kids are more apt to go with it because they understand the reasoning behind it.
We did some thinking. Should we just buy the candy from them and toss it in the garbage? That seemed so wasteful. At the same time, we work so hard to educate them about healthy choices and why it’s important to choose foods that nourish their growing bodies that it just doesn’t align for us to feast on a basket of candies made up from artificial ingredients, flavorings, food dyes and other ingredients which have a harmful effect. My husband and I came up with an idea! We decided together, on a new tradition. From now on, we would donate the candy to our troops overseas, but we wouldn’t force the kids to do it – we would give them the opportunity to want to do it!
You may have heard of people sending care packages overseas to our troops. I did a little research and was excited to discover Operation Gratitude. When Halloween candy is sent to them, it’s included in care packages sent overseas to American troops. You simply fill out their online donation form, and then receive an email with further instruction on how to ship your package. In 2018 alone, over 264,000 care packages were sent! We decided to go for it… but how would we get the kids on board?
Here’s the deal, while Halloween candy offers nothing in the way of health, we don’t want to deny them trying or eating things they see other kids eating. We also don’t want to say, “hey, you just had all this fun collecting as much candy as you could and now we expect you to give it all away!” This is where some good ol’ fashioned bribery and deal-making come into play.
Every year, leading up to Halloween, our kids anticipate this deal and say “I think this year I’m going to keep my candy.” Yet every year, after trick or treating, when they dump all their candy out to sort and we discuss the choices – they ALWAYS go for the money and making someone else’s day. It’s a great opportunity as parents to discuss the importance of giving back and making others feel cared for and thought of. A big part of the fun, is making personalized letters from the kids, to add to the care package – they love doing this part, and were so excited to receive thank you letters for their candy!
Once they choose the option to donate, sorting becomes a fun task of deciding which pieces of candy they will keep for themselves. If they have some full-size candy bars, they can choose 3 total, if they are choosing fun size candy packages, they can choose 5 total. Figure out a number you’re comfortable with that suits your childs age. When the girls were toddlers, I would tell the they can choose 3 fun size candy packages, and it’s just evolved over time and with their age. I want it to be fair for them, but also a chance for them to consider giving to others instead of focusing solely on their own wants and needs. We began with $5 per child in the beginning, and are now up to $20, but the number can be anything you feel comfortable with.
