If a recipe for 12 generous gluten free ricotta pancakes has only 2/3 cup (8 grams per pancake) of flour and 1/4 cup of sugar (4 grams per pancake), it
probably qualifies as low carb, right? I honestly don’t know, though. I know that some of you
want me to know (I even got an email asking me if it was even
legal for me to post recipes without nutrition information!
P.S. it’s perfectly legal, no worries). And part of me wants to know and wants to care, for you, you know? But mostly, I simply can’t commit to either the time it would take to plug all the information for every recipe into an online nutrition calculator—or the weight of that responsibility. Now, I cook and bake from all 3
Gluten Free on a Shoestring cookbooks all. the. time. And one of my favorite recipes from my
first cookbook is the Ricotta Pancakes on page 67. Every time I make them, I think, wow, these are so light and fluffy, and they really must be low carb and
isn’t that nice. But … that’s as far as I ever get.
Recently I started playing around with the recipe from the book (one I know from emails over the years is also a reader favorite! yay!), and found that it works even better with my basic gum-free gluten free flour blend. So ridiculously light and fluffy! And the batter is so easy to pour, too, which makes the actual pancake cooking a dream.
Instead of the subtle lemon flavor from the lemon zest that the original recipe calls for, I added 2 teaspoons of vanilla extract plus the seeds from half a vanilla bean (I buy vanilla beans pretty cheap in bulk online and keep them stored in rum, which I occasionally use as homemade vanilla extract but mostly just use to store the beans and keep them from drying out or going bad). The result? Light, fluffy, deeply vanilla, probably low-carb, definitely low-sugar gluten free ricotta pancakes.
Prep time: 10 minutes Cook time: 15 minutes Yield: About 12 pancakes
Ingredients
2/3 cup (93 g) basic xanthan gum-free gluten free flour blend (61 grams superfine white rice flour + 21 grams potato starch + 11 grams tapioca starch/flour)
1/4 cup (50 g) sugar
1 teaspoon baking powder
2 eggs (120 g, out of shell) at room temperature, beaten
Seeds from 1/2 vanilla bean
1 cup (250 g) low-moisture ricotta cheese (part-skim or whole milk), at room temperature
1/2 cup (4 fluid ounces) milk, at room temperature
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
Directions
In a large bowl, place the flour blend, sugar and baking powder, and whisk to combine. In a separate small bowl, place the eggs, vanilla seeds, ricotta cheese, milk and vanilla extract, and beat to combine well. Create a well in the center of the dry ingredients and add wet ingredients, and beat until smooth. The batter should be pourable.
Heat a griddle or lightly greased nonstick or cast iron skillet over medium heat. Grease it lightly, and pour as many portions of about ¼ cup of batter onto the hot griddle as can fit comfortably, without touching. Allow to cook until large bubbles begin to break through the top of the batter in each pancake and the edges are set (about 1 ½ minutes). With a wide, flat spatula, carefully flip over each pancake, and continue to cook until set (about another 2 minutes). Remove from the skillet, and repeat with the remaining batter.
Adapted from Ricotta Pancakes on page 67 of Gluten Free on a Shoestring: 125 Easy Recipes for Eating Well on the Cheap (2011).
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