My first bite of gingerbread pancakes was at a French-style bistro six blocks from where I lived in San Francisco more than 25 years ago. These pancakes are still on the brunch menu at Zazie, which survived the COVID pandemic and continues to thrive in an ever-changing food scene.
When I left the city, I came up with a variation of these spiced griddle cakes. This recipe uses my favorite ginger dessert spices, including a pinch of freshly ground black pepper. I made pancakes without sugar for years before learning that just a little helps to crisp the edges and brown the surface evenly, an effect that is even more noticeable with paler sourdough pancakes.
Cultured Buttermilk helps to make pancakes not just flavorful but also fluffy. When you stir the batter lightly and then let it rest briefly, its leavening agents start to interact with the tangy buttermilk and form air bubbles. Substitutions include sour cream or yogurt thinned with milk until pourable or just milk.
I usually serve gingerbread pancakes with homemade fruit curd, whether a classic lemon curd or one with homegrown rhubarb or berries, a recipe I’ll share next week. Because fruit curd uses egg yolks, I developed this gingerbread pancake recipe with just egg whites. The molasses makes the batter quite heavy, but beating the whites and folding them in just before you cook the pancakes gives them extra loft. If you plan to top the pancakes with maple or a homemade fruit syrup instead, beat a whole room-temperature egg and fold it into the batter before you let it rest.
Gingerbread Pancakes
Makes about 12 pancakes
1-1/2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon dark brown sugar
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon sea salt
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
Pinch of grated nutmeg
Pinch of freshly ground black pepper
3 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted
1/4 cup molasses
1-1/4 cups cultured buttermilk or milk
2 egg whites
Butter for cooking
In a large bowl, combine the flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Stir in the cinnamon, ginger, cloves, nutmeg and pepper. In a large glass measuring cup, melt the butter and when cool, mix in the molasses and buttermilk. Add the butter mixture to the flour mixture. With a fork, stir the batter until just blended but still lumpy. Let rest for 15 minutes.
In a medium bowl, beat the egg whites until they are stiff but not dry. Gently fold the egg whites into the batter.
Heat a frying pan over medium-low heat and coat it generously with butter. Scoop the batter into the pan, 1/4 cup at a time, leaving space around each pancake. Cook the pancakes until bubbles form and start to pop, and then flip and cook until the second side is golden brown. Serve immediately, or place the pancakes in a single layer on a rack in a 200°F oven to serve them as a batch.
Julie Laing is a Bigfork-based cookbook author and food blogger at TwiceAsTasty.com.