Tess Ward's Banana and Almond Protein Pancakes

Over the weekend, I decided to try making Tess Ward's Banana and Almond Protein Pancakes (I'll add the link to the clip below). Tess promotes the healthiness of this recipe and replaces wheat with almond meal (ground almonds), almond milk, and banana. My initial thought was that, honestly, it wasn't going to be so great. I wasn't sure how the whole 'almond meal' thing was going to go as a replacement for wheat. I was unsure about the consistency of the batter, how well it would hold together, how it would cook and most importantly, how it would taste without that good ol' wheat. 

Ingredients:

2 large, ripe bananas

200g/ 2 cups ground almonds 

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon 

2 heaped tablespoons chia seeds

4 large eggs 

460ml/ 2 cups almond milk 

2 tbs coconut oil 

To Serve: coconut yoghurt, coconut yoghurt, honey, flaked almonds, a sliced banana  

Method: 

Place the bananas in a large bowl and mash to a smooth-ish pulp. Add the ground almonds, cinnamon and chia seeds to the banana bowl with a pinch of salt.

Add the eggs and milk and whisk well until you have a thick batter. 

Heat a large non-stick pan over a high heat. 

Add a dollop of coconut oil to the pan, swirl it around to coat the bottom. 

Add the 1 tablespoon of batter for each pancake. 

Wait until the top of the pancake begins to bubble, then flip it over carefully to cook on the other side so both are golden brown.  

Repeat the process until all the batter is used up.  

Serve with toppings of choice.

I followed the recipe (as per below). It is supposed to serve 4. I was sceptical about that, too. I cooked it twice, first replacing almond milk with soy milk and forgetting to add chia seeds. The second cook I used almond milk, included chia seeds and added some roughly chopped almonds to the batter.  

First thing I noticed while making the batter was that there was so much milk. So. Much. Milk. I used the two cups of water and the batter was a lot runnier than a standard pancake mix you get in the little plastic, shakey container. When the batter hit the pan, it seemed to immediately thicken up, (probably something to do with the almond meal). 

When I made the pancakes, I found the outside burnt quicker than a standard pancake mix, while the inside was still soft. And it was so difficult to flip (I'm not a flipping pro as it is). They kept breaking. I ate one immediately when it was still warm. I threw another teaspoon of cinnamon in the batter for a bit of extra oomph.

The pancakes definitely took a little longer to cook than normal pancakes; I wouldn't recommend cooking them while time-crunched. But mum and I ate them as I made them - they tasted so good! The extra cinnamon gave it another layer of flavour and the roughly chopped almonds added a little more texture. The pancakes were filling without leaving me feeling overly-full or bloated like other pancakes sometimes did. 

Overall, tasted amazing and really not that complicated to make. I was surprised, with a few roughly chopped almonds and the added cinnamon, I would make it again and serve others to impress! 

I would:

Add a little more cinnamon

Throw in some roughly chopped almonds

Put on a low heat for a longer time (they already take a bit of time to cook one, so it's not exactly the meal to cook if you're in a rush) 

And have ice cream, cream, yoghurt and honey on standby for serving!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=orxH33EDI1o