These fully fermented sourdough pancakes are fluffy and tender with irresistible, crispy edges. Made with six simple ingredients, they are not only easy and quick, but also so delicious when topped with butter, maple syrup, raw honey, or fruit topping.
These fluffy sourdough pancakes are deliciously light and fluffy with a little bit of crispiness at the edges and the tangy, delicious flavor of sourdough. Our family is already a huge fan of pancakes, and it’s easy to see why this particular recipe is a family favorite. Add toppings like homemade blueberry sauce or homemade whipped cream with a sprinkling of chocolate chips or fresh berries to make an extra special weekend morning treat.
And while butter, maple syrup, and fresh fruit are always excellent options, you can even go for savory toppings, like an over-easy fried egg or crumbled sausage. Eggs, sausage, and pancakes all pair wonderfully with maple syrup!
If you’re familiar with sourdough, you’re aware that fermented sourdough recipes require some waiting to allow for the fermentation. Recipes like my English muffin recipe, sourdough cinnamon rolls, or sourdough Italian bread are pretty typical examples. It’s always worth the time invested!
If you’re not familiar with sourdough, I have plenty of resources on how to make your own sourdough starter from scratch, how to maintain your starter, and how to use sourdough starter.
However, this delicious recipe requires no waiting. There is no added flour, just the fed, fermented, active, and bubbly starter and a few other ingredients to make the perfect pancakes. As long as you have two cups of starter that was fed in the last 12 hours, you’re good to go!
Why You’ll Love This Recipe
Simple ingredients – With a mature starter and simple pantry staples, you have the tools for the best homemade sourdough pancakes.
Delicious sourdough flavor – The fed and fermented sourdough starter provides that subtle sourdough taste that works so well in baked goods.
Chewy, fluffy texture – These pancakes are thick and fluffy, perfect for absorbing butter and syrup. Sourdough also yields a chewier texture than regular pancakes.
Ingredients
Sourdough starter – Use a bubbly, active starter that has been fed within 4-12 hours of starting the recipe. While you could use leftover sourdough discard, the pancakes won’t be very fluffy.
Oil – Use a neutral oil or swap it out for melted butter. To make these pancakes dairy-free, stick to a neutral oil.
Honey – You can use sugar or brown sugar in place of honey, if you prefer.
A full ingredient list with exact amounts can be found in the recipe card below.
How to Make Sourdough Pancakes
Step 1: Mix the sourdough starter, eggs, oil, honey, and salt in a large mixing bowl. Add the baking soda last and watch the starter foam up.
Step 2: To achieve those crispy pancake edges, preheat a tablespoon of oil or butter in a cast-iron skillet on medium heat. After it is hot enough to produce a sizzle, pour 1/2 cup of batter right onto the hot oil. At this point, turn the stove down to medium-low heat so that the pancake can cook through without the bottom burning. Remember the “flip only one time” rule.
Step 3: After the top is nice and bubbly and no more bubbles are being produced, give the pancake a flip. The first side may take 2 to 3 minutes. After flipping, cook for another 30 seconds to a minute on the second side, until cooked through and golden brown.
Step 4: Keep the cooked pancakes in a warm place as you finish the rest of the batter. You can use a heat-safe dish in the oven on the lowest heat setting. Serve warm with your favorite pancake toppings and enjoy! Leftovers can be stored in an airtight container in the refrigerator for several days.
Tips
- The key to those crisp edges is cooking the pancakes in a preheated cast-iron skillet or frying pan with melted oil or butter. Cook on one side for about 30 seconds, flipping only when the top is bubbled. You should only flip once!
- If you plan to add blueberries or chocolate chips, place them into the uncooked side while the cakes are cooking. I find that if the chocolate or blueberries actually make contact with the skillet, the pancakes tend to stick. This is why I don’t stir them into the batter.
- You can prepare this batter the night before, but I recommend waiting until the next morning, just before cooking, to add the baking soda. It’s a great way to get a jumpstart on a healthy and tasty breakfast.
- The first pancake rarely turns out well. No worries. This is the time to adjust the heat to make sure it is not too hot or too cool.
- You can tell a pancake is ready to flip when all the bubbles have popped and no more bubbles are forming.
- If you need a gluten-free option, try this recipe for sourdough buckwheat pancakes.
Recipe FAQs
Yes, just lay the cooled pancakes on a baking sheet in a single layer and freeze them for 1-2 hours. Stack the frozen pancakes and place them in a freezer-safe container or bag. Placing parchment paper between pancakes can be very helpful to prevent them from sticking. Freeze for several months, reheating in the oven, toaster oven, or toaster until warmed through.
Yes. You can make this batter the night before and keep it stored overnight in the refrigerator. However, I would recommend waiting to add the baking soda and whisking it in right before you start cooking. Overnight sourdough pancakes have an even stronger flavor and more fermentation benefits.
This is most likely an issue with the cooking process. Under-cooking the pancakes can cause them to be gummy, as well as the pan being too hot. If the pan is too hot, the outside of the pancakes will cook much faster than the inside.
Sourdough starter is perfect for baking sourdough bread, desserts, breakfasts, and more. Here are some of our favorite ways to use sourdough starter.
Pizza crust
Flatbread
Whole wheat bread
Chicken pot pie
Biscuits
Waffles or blueberry pancakes
Baked sourdough donuts
Sourdough discard is generally more runny in consistency, which results in flatter pancakes. When I make sourdough discard pancakes, I add flour to the batter, which changes the other ingredients, as well.
More Sourdough Recipes from the Farmhouse
- Sourdough Orange Cinnamon Rolls
- Sourdough Cinnamon Star Bread
- Sourdough Croissant Bread
- Sourdough Bundt Cake
- Baked Sourdough Donuts
If you try this recipe and love it, I would love it if you could come back and give it 5 stars! Tag me on Instagram @farmhouseonboone.
The Best Sourdough Pancakes
Video
Ingredients
- 2 cups active sourdough starter
- 2 eggs
- 1/4 cup neutral oil
- 2 tablespoons honey
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- neutral oil for frying
Instructions
- Mix the sourdough starter, eggs, oil, honey, and salt in a large mixing bowl. Add the baking soda last and watch the starter foam up.
- To achieve those crispy pancake edges, preheat a tablespoon of oil or butter in a cast-iron skillet on medium heat. After it is hot enough to produce a sizzle, pour 1/2 cup of batter right onto the hot oil. At this point, turn the stove down to medium-low heat so that the pancake can cook through without the bottom burning. Remember the “flip only one time” rule.
- After the top is nice and bubbly and no more bubbles are being produced, give the pancake a flip. This may take 2 to 3 minutes. After flipping, cook for another 30 seconds to a minute, until cooked through and golden brown.
- Keep the cooked pancakes in a warm place as you finish the rest of the batter. You can use a heat-safe dish in the oven on the lowest heat setting. Serve pancakes warm with your favorite toppings and enjoy!
Notes
- The key to crisp edges is cooking the pancakes in a preheated cast-iron skillet with melted oil or butter. Only flip them once!
- If you plan to add blueberries or chocolate chips, place them into the uncooked side while the cakes are cooking.
- You can prepare this batter the night before, but I recommend waiting until the next morning, just before cooking, to add the baking soda.
- The first pancake rarely turns out well. No worries. This is the time to adjust the heat to make sure it is not too hot or too cool.
- You can tell a pancake is ready to flip when all the bubbles have popped and no more bubbles are forming.
- If you need a gluten-free option, try this recipe for sourdough buckwheat pancakes.
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
I make these all the time. I’ve started lowering the hydration in my starter just so my discard will be thicker for pancakes! This recipe is basically bulletproof. Typically I use starter straight from the fridge. I often replace the coconut oil with butter or leave it out altogether. I used applesauce instead once (and cut out the honey so my baby could eat it), and it was really good!
Thanks for converting me to cast iron, too. It took a few months for me to get used to using cast iron but now I don’t think I’ll ever go back.
We make this every week in our home and love it! Thank you! I’m wondering if applesauce would be a good replacement for the eggs in this recipe? Sadly, I have to cut them out for a bit as my breastfed infant may be allergic. Well, I’ll give it a try!
You can make an “egg” using flax meal and water. It’s easy and you can Google the instructions
We’ve made these EVERY DAY this week! 🙂 I’m trying to invigorate my newly made starter, and I can’t stand the thought of throwing half down the drain or feeding it to my already-well-fed chickies. We LOVE these pancakes! I love that it doesn’t use extra flour–just the discarded starter. We also made your pizza dough this week (which had a super chewy, interesting texture.) We’re on to the next thing, which will be English muffins. Thanks so much for posting recipes and videos. Lots of hard work, but you’re preserving food traditions that are dying off. Thank you!!! 🙂
Maybe try a mashed banana in for eggs? I might try it myself sometime soon!
I meant to respond to the comment below (by Breanna) instead of yours, sorry!
I made this for the first time this morning. They were really delicous. I have made many different types of pancakes in the past, but these were really really good. They didn’t upset my stomach either, Thanks Lisa
I really enjoyed these. I did have to make a little alteration probably because of elevation. I added about 3 tbsp of flour to thicken the batter a bit.
I love these pancakes! I don’t cook with coconut oil, so the first time I substituted with butter instead and they were pretty oily. However, the next time I made it with half as much butter as the recipe calls for coconut oil, and they were PERFECT! So delicious! I also cook them on a griddle so I can make a big batch quickly, and it works great! Raspberries are super good as a “topping”, I smash them and then add them to the batter right after I pour them out on my griddle (if you don’t smash them they stick out too much and will burn when you flip them) love this recipe!
These were a huge hit with my adult sons. Thank you !!
These are the best pancakes I’ve ever made. They have become a Saturday morning tradition in my home.
I know this sounds silly, but I’m a first time sourdough maker, once you use 2 cups of your starter for pancakes do you add a cup of flour and water back into your starter and sit it on your counter to go through the process again? Or do you add what you took out? So 2 cups starter then add 2 cups flour and water?? Sorry if this is a silly question… Thank you
It depends on how much starter you have left. I like to keep my starter at about a 1:1:1 ratio, so 1 cup of starter: 1 cup flour : 1 cup water.
Let’s say you started with 3 cups of starter, total. Separate your starter into two containers. The one for the pancake recipe (the “discard”) will be 2 cups. The one for future recipes (“active starter”) will be 1 cup. If your active starter amounts to about a cup, then you only need to add one cup flour and one cup water.
If the bowl with active starter has 2 cups in it, then add 2 cups flour and 2 cups water. It’s not an exact science though, you can mess around with it and see what works!
I personally use a scrapings method. I keep 2 Mason jars in my fridge, one with active starter and one with discard for future pancakes. In the first I’ll put 1/4 cup active starter to 1/4 flour and 1/4 water and leave that on my counter, and keep the discard jar in the fridge.
It’s important to note that you’re using a volume ratio and not a weight ratio. Many bakers use weights and sourdough starter at 100% hydration would be 1:1 by weight, or approximately 1:1.8 water:flour. I think maybe I’ll measure out how much 1 cup of 100% hydration starter weighs, and then try to algebra my back to your proportions of starter + water to get 2 cups of 180% hydration starter.
For 1:1 hydration (which this author’s starter is not): Weigh the starter you have left. if it’s 4 oz, add 4 oz (1/2 cup) of water and 4 oz flour (15/16 cup) to maintain it. When it’s hungry again, take out 8 oz of discard for pancakes and leave 4 oz of starter, to which you again add 4 oz water + 4 oz flour each feeding so the starter stays the same size. Or have a bigger starter (for ex. 8 oz) and add more flour (8oz, or 1 + 7/8 cup) and water (8oz, 1 cup) in proportion by weight to grow more of it, which might give you the amount for this recipe. This is 1:1 hydration by weight. If hydration is too low for this recipe, add more water or milk, probably between 1/2 cup to 1 cup more liquid.
100% is best by grams 40grams starter 40grams water and 40grams flour
These were a delicious breakfast over the weekend! Everyone loved them!