Heart Shaped Chocolate Chip Sourdough Pancakes

Sharing is caring!

These heart shaped chocolate chip sourdough pancakes are perfect for that special Valentine’s Day or birthday breakfast.  The tangy flavor of the sourdough combined with the chocolate chips are delicious when covered with a strawberry topping.  These light and fluffy homemade sourdough pancakes remind me of Krusteaz pancakes.  I looked for a long time to find the best pancake recipe that didn’t produce “flat” pancakes, and yet was still made with plenty of sourdough discard and fully fermented.  After tweaking this recipe a bit, it has become our favorite from-scratch sourdough pancake recipe.  If you’re looking for dairy free or oil free sourdough pancakes, there are substitute options listed below.

Heart Shaped Sourdough Pancakes

To make perfect heart-shaped pancakes, you can make little forms out of tin foil or use metal heart shaped cookie cutters.  Just place them on hot skillet and fill with pancake batter.  Once the pancakes are set, you can easily remove the form, and flip the pancake.  

We like to eat a good breakfast before getting started on all the work around the homestead each day.  Sourdough french toast, strawberry crepes and sourdough breakfast pizza are some of our favorites.  

Make Ahead Pancakes

I like to mix up all the ingredients for these heart shaped pancakes the night before, so I can get a healthy and filling breakfast on the table in 15 or 20 minutes the following morning.  The other benefit of making it the night before is that the flour you add to the recipe becomes fully fermented by the sourdough starter.  This makes these pancakes easier to digest.  If, however, you forget to mix them up the night before, you can still whip them up in the morning and they cook up just fine.

What is sourdough discard?  

Sourdough starter discard is fermented flour and water that has to be removed or discarded from your sourdough starter before you can feed your starter more flour and water.  It should never actually be thrown out (or discarded) though, because it can be used in hundreds of different recipes.  I always try to keep a fair amount of sourdough discard in a jar in my refrigerator. That way anytime I want to make these sourdough discard pancakes or any other discard recipe, I can do so quickly.  Most recipes that call for sourdough discard rely on something else to actually “raise” the end product if applicable. In this case, we’re using baking powder and baking soda as the leavening agent to make light and fluffy pancakes.

What are the health benefits of sourdough?

Anytime you add a fermented element like sourdough to a recipe, it becomes more nutritious because it contains live probiotics and good bacteria that help with gut health and digestion.  Gluten and phytic acid are naturally present in wheat, and are usually what is to blame for people not being able to digest gluten well.  When the grain is fermented through the sourdough process, the gluten and phytic acid are broken down, making it easier to digest.  A lot of people that struggle with gluten intolerance (not people with celiac), can digest food made with sourdough without any issue, especially if the recipe is allowed to sit out for a few hours and “long ferment”.   

In addition, phytic acid is an anti-nutrient that blocks absorption of the nutrients found in wheat. During the sourdough fermentation process, the phytic acid gets broken down and the nutrients are more bio-available to the body. This is why baking with sourdough is so important for our health.

Cast Iron Skillet

The best way to cook sourdough pancakes, or almost anything made with sourdough in general, is on a cast iron pan.  I like to use a generous amount of butter on my cast iron pan right before adding the pancake batter which gives them an incredible flavor, but you can also use coconut oil or beef tallow if you’re running short on butter.  Cast iron keeps a nice even heat and gives these pancakes a crispy edge that is hard to beat.  

There is also something so nostalgic about mixing up an old-fashioned sourdough pancake and cooking it on a cast iron pan like they would’ve done in the homestead days of long ago.  Once you learn how to cook on cast iron, you will never go back to cooking on anything else.  They are the most long-lasting set of cookware you can find, and they give your recipes a flavor and texture that is hard to beat.

Why you will love this recipe?

• Easy:  these heart pancakes take just minutes to whip up.  They are an obvious choice for breakfast, but work well for any meal you need to make quickly.
• Fun:  make Valentines Day breakfast fun with these simple pancakes.  Your kids will love it.  They also work well for special birthday breakfasts.
• Delicious:  the tangy taste of the sourdough along with the creamy buttermilk give these pancakes a delicious flavor.  Once you try these pancakes, you won’t need to search for another recipe.
• Healthy:  because they are made with sourdough discard and can be mixed up the night before, your body will get all the benefits of a long fermented probiotic rich meal. 
• Flexible:  If you are missing one or more of the ingredients, you can substitute a similar ingredient and still get a good result. 

Ways to enjoy these overnight sourdough pancakes?

• Slathered with homemade butter from our Jersey milk cows and topped with hot strawberry sauce.
• We also enjoy them with real maple syrup.
• If you’re looking for something extra delicious, make buttermilk syrup to cover these yummy pancakes.
• They are also really good with peanut butter and then bananas or applesauce on top.  
• You could also make them in the summer and add fresh berries and whipped cream.  

These pancakes are sure to stick to your ribs and keep you going all morning, no matter how much work you have to do.

Tips

• Don’t have chocolate chips?  Just make them without. 
• Use a wooden clothespin to hold your tin foil forms together.  Be sure to grease your cookie cutters or tin foil forms before making the first pancakes in them.  You won’t have to grease them when adding the second pancake to them.
• ​Be careful not to fill the heart molds too full, keeping in mind that the pancakes will raise as they cook.
• I like to use buttermilk in my pancake recipe because it makes them even more fluffy and adds a greater depth of flavor.  If you don’t have buttermilk, you can just use regular milk or add a little bit of lemon juice to the milk and let it set for a couple minutes to make imitation buttermilk.
• You can use any kind of fat in this recipe.  Melted butter, coconut oil, beef tallow or regular oil.  Wanting to make it oil free?  Try using applesauce in place of the oil.  It’ll turn out just fine.
• It’s important to use a mix of baking powder and baking soda for the fluffliest pancake
• You can use sugar, honey or maple syrup as sweetener and they will turn out amazing
• Don’t skip the vanilla.  This along with cooking them in butter is my favorite part of the recipe
• Watch the bubbles on the top as they are cooking, as soon as the bubbles start to pop, they are ready to flip.  
• Before you flip the heart-shaped pancakes, remove the foil forms.  Pro tip: use the clothespin that held the form together to pull the foil form off of the pancakes.  They will be hot.
• You can also make pink pancakes by adding a couple of Tablespoons of beet root powder to your pancake batter

FAQ:

Can you freeze sourdough pancakes?

Yes you can freeze sourdough pancakes.  The best way is to lay them out on a parchment covered baking sheet and flash freeze for a couple of hours.  Then stack them up and put them in a freezer safe container or ziplock bag.  You can also freeze them by putting a piece of parchment paper between each pancake and then freezing in an airtight container.  They will keep for 2-3 months in the freezer.  You can re-heat them in a toaster, microwave or oven for a quick and satisfying meal.

Can you use this recipe to make sourdough waffles?

Yes, this recipe makes excellent sourdough waffles

This post contains affiliate links, which means I make a small commission at no extra cost to you. See my full disclosure here

Ingredients

• Sourdough Discard – I like to make these pancakes with sourdough discard, but you can also make them with active starter.  As long as you’re adding some kind of sourdough starter, you’ll get a good result.  
• Buttermilk – if you don’t have buttermilk, you can use regular or non-dairy milk, and just add 1 tsp. of lemon juice to the milk to give it a bit of a tangy flavor.  I like to let my buttermilk set out on the counter for a day and turn it into cultured buttermilk.  It adds a greater depth of flavor and more probiotics to your recipe
• Unbleached all-purpose white flour – I like to purchase my all purpose flour from Azure Standard.  They are like a Costco or a Sam’s without the storefront, and they help to connect farmers directly to the people buying the food.  They provide only high quality ingredients and have many organic options.
• Sugar – you can also use honey or maple syrup
• Fat – I like to use melted butter, beef tallow or coconut oil.  If you’re wanting to make them oil free you can also use applesauce in place of the oil.  Butter is my favorite for frying them in.
• Eggs
• Baking Soda
• Vanilla Extract
• Salt

Tools you may need

• Large mixing bowl
• Cups and measuring spoons
• Whisk
• Heart shaped metal cookie cutter or make your own molds out of tin foil
• Ladle
• Spatula
• Cast iron or non-stick skillet – I like to use a cast-iron skillet as it gives the pancakes a beautiful crisp exterior and is a healthier option.

How To Make Heart Shaped Molds Out Of Tin Foil

If you’re like me, you don’t have a whole bunch of large heart cookie cutters lying around.  So I just make my own heart shaped molds out of tin foil.  You’ll need a piece of foil about 12” long.  The longer it is the bigger your heart pancake mold will be.  

Make a 1 inch fold on the long edge of the foil.  Continue folding the foil over itself until you have a stiff 1 inch piece of foil.  

Fold it in half and crease it with the fold facing you.  

Hold the folded crease with one hand, and bend the two sides around so they touch on the bottom and form the shape of a heart.  

Clip it together on the bottom with a wooden clothespin.  

Adjust the mold necessary so it makes the perfect outline of a heart.  

You can easily make several of these so you can cook several heart shaped pancakes at a time.  

How To Make Heart Shaped Chocolate Chip Sourdough Pancakes

Mix together all the dry ingredients in a large bowl. Then add in all the wet ingredients including the chocolate chips right on top.  Stir well using a danish whisk.  

Cover and let the batter ferment at room temperature overnight, OR bake right away.  Leaving it set overnight will give you all the long fermentation health benefits from the sourdough.

When ready to cook the pancakes, heat a large cast iron skillet over medium-low heat.  You can also use more than one skillet to get these cooked faster if you’re in a hurry.

Add butter to the skillet.

Place heart shaped molds or cookie cutters in the skillet.

Pour a ladle full of the pancake batter inside of the mold.

Let each pancake cook until the bubbles start popping on top and the edges are set.

Unclip the bottom of each foil mold and carefully remove the mold.  Pro tip: use the clothespin to grap the hot foil and pull it off the pancake.  That way you won’t burn your fingers.

Then gently flip the pancake with a spatula.

Cook for another 2-3 minutes until golden brown on both sides.

Transfer to a platter and top with your favorite pancake toppings.

If you try this recipe, let me know by leaving a comment. And if you like it? Give it a 5 star rating!