Lemon pancakes with zesty lemon sauce

My favourite recipe for light and fluffy lemon pancakes served with zesty lemon sauce. Easy recipe to make for the perfect breakfast or brunch. Serve warm or cold with an extra drizzling of lemon and choice of your toppings, such as blueberries, cream cheese or honey.

Why make this recipe?

• Great lemon flavour pancakes
• Light & fluffy pancakes recipe
• Easy to make recipe
• Excellent ‘base’ pancake recipe that goes with any fruit or zesty topping, syrup or sauce

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My top tips on making lemon pancake recipe successfully first time round

Use organic – untreated lemon for the lemon zest and freshly zest the lemon just before you make this recipe.

Mix the dry ingredients first and then add all the wet ingredients. If the batter feels a little too thick, add 1-2 tablespoons of milk, but only if needed.

What makes this lemon pancake recipe work

• Using a good quality vanilla essence, extract or a paste makes a real difference to the taste.
• Using an untreated lemon for the zest is very important as you want to make sure that you only eat fresh lemon and not any chemicals. Untreated lemons are also more flavoursome, so the pancake lemon flavour will be more intense.
• Adding a pinch of salt helps to sharpen the flavours and won’t make your pancakes taste bland

Any specialist equipment needed to make lemon pancakes?

You don’t need specialist equipment to fry your pancakes, any large frying pan or a flat griddle will be fine to use.

Since I make pancakes quite often, I’ve treated myself to a special pancake frying pan which, I think makes a difference in how the pancakes rise.

The pancake pan has deeper cavities, which prevents the pancake batter from spreading out and makes them rise a bit higher. This also means that they are thicker and that makes the pancakes lighter.

I think having a specialist pancake pan is totally worth it, as it also helps me to portion the pancakes better into more even rounds. My pancake pan makes about 8,5 cm wide pancakes, which is about 3 inches.

Time saving tip

You can double or triple this easy recipe for lemon pancakes and make more pancakes in one go. These pancakes are easy to freeze and they taste great when defrosted, so you can make a lot and freeze them for later.

Pro tip

To make these lemon pancakes evenly cooked, make sure that you heat your frying pan only to low to medium heat.

Too much heat is going to burn the pancakes and they also might be undercooked in the middle.

Always use extra butter or vegetable oil to brush the frying pan to make sure that your pancakes won’t stick to the pan, especially the first batch.

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Ingredients & Possible Substitutions for lemon pancake recipe

Flour

I’ve used all-purpose – plain flour (cake flour) in this recipe.

You could replace it with other types of flour, but to be honest I really like that the flavour of the lemon (with the hint of vanilla and butter) is coming through in this recipe and I didn’t want to use any strong or wholemeal flours that would compete with the flavours.

Baking powder

I’ve used regular baking powder for this pancake recipe.

Sugar

This recipe will work with any white granulated or white caster of sugar. I’ve used regular caster sugar.

Darker sugars, such as light brown sugar, coconut sugar or similar types of sugar will add colour and flavour to your pancakes, so I would use them in this recipe. This is because the lemon flavour is quite delicate and stronger flavours might overpower it.

If you want to use liquid sugars, honey (or possibly maple syrup and some of the maple syrup alternatives will work in this recipe) is the best match flavour wise. You might need to use a little less milk to compensate for the extra liquid sugar syrup.

Salt

I always add a tiny pinch of salt to my pancake batter because it helps to bring all the flavours together. I use regular fine table or cooking salt.

You can add anything up to 1/8 of teaspoon (use 1/4 teaspoon measure and only fill it half with salt) of salt, depending on your taste buds!

Milk

I’ve used semi-skimmed dairy milk for these lemon pancakes, but other types of milks are also suitable, although avoid using milks with strong flavours (such as soya, coconut, hazelnut or almond milk).

• full – fat milk (whole milk)
• skimmed milk
• dairy milk (lactose free)
• rice milk
• oat milk
• 50% water & 50% white yoghurt milk
• 50% cream & 50% water or milk

Vanilla essence

Don’t worry if you don’t have any vanilla essence or extract of a paste, but if you do have it, vanilla makes a lovely addition to the flavour of your pancakes. The better quality you have, the better taste.

Lemon Zest

Make sure that you use untreated or organic lemons for this recipe as the flavour will be more intense.

Butter

I’ve used unsalted butter in these lemon pancakes as I wanted to add extra buttery flavour.

You could leave out the butter if you don’t have any, but you’d be missing out on the rich flavour.

How to make lemon pancakes with zesty lemon sauce

In a large mixing bowl, mix together the flour, baking powder, sugar, lemon zest and salt using a whisk or spatula.

Add the rest of the ingredients – egg, melted butter, milk and vanilla extract and use a hand whisk to combine until smooth.

Heat your frying pan (or pancake pan) on low to medium heat and lightly grease it with oil to make sure your pancakes won’t stick.

Spoon or pour your pancake batter on the frying pan either using a large spoon or ladle to measure your batter depending on how large you wan’t your pancakes to be. If using a regular frying pan, leave a space between the pancakes so that they can cook properly.

Cook your pancakes for about 1 minute or until you see bubbles form on the pancake surface and the pancake batter starts to look dry. Gently lift the bottom of one pancake – it should be very lightly brown. If it is, flip or turn the pancake using a non-stick spatula and cook on the other side for another minute or so.

To make the zesty lemon sauce, simply mix together freshly squeezed lemon juice with icing sugar to give you a runny lemon sauce. Drizzle over the pancakes and add more lemon zest and fresh fruit like blueberries.

If you prefer you can just use the freshly squeezed lemon juice to drizzle over the pancakes without adding any more sugar.

How else you can make this lemon pancake recipe? Allergies, dietary requirements

This light and fluffy lemon pancake recipe (as it is) is not suitable for a gluten or dairy-free diet. It’s also not suitable for vegan diet, although it’s fine for vegetarian diet. Here is how you can make a few tweaks to this recipe to make it to suit your diet:

Gluten-Free Version

Swap the plain flour for gluten-free plain flour mix and either add 1/4 teaspoon of xantham gum or use it as it is if your gluten-free flour already has a xantham gum mixed in.

Dairy Free Version

Swap the regular milk for your favourite plant based milk, bearing in mind that something like coconut milk will affect the flavour of the pancakes too much. I usually use rice or oat milk to keep the flavour the same.

Use plant based butter or leave it out altogether and use vegetable oil instead of butter to grease the frying pan.

Vegan Version

Use vegetable oil instead of the butter to grease the frying pan and use plant based butter for the pancakes. Swap the dairy milk for dairy free – plant based milk, such as rice or oat milk.

To replace the egg, use extra baking powder, vegetable oil and water (1-1/2 tablespoons of vegetable oil mixed with 1-1/2 tablespoons of water and 1 teaspoon of baking powder to replace one egg.).

Based on my personal experience, I wouldn’t use other egg replacements such as banana or chia or flax seeds egg because they will affect the flavour of the pancakes too much (the lemon flavour is quite delicate).

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Can you add lemon zest to pancake mix?

Yes, absolutely! If you have ready made pancake mix, you can add lemon zest (and lemon juice or lemon flavouring) to the batter and make your lemon pancakes this way. I always have pancake mix in my kitchen cupboard (as pancake mix doesn’t go off that easily) and it’s nice to make it into a different flavour every time I decide to use it.

Ideally, you want to add zest of one lemon per each cup of pancake mix (about 120-130 grams), but if you are making a large batch and only have one lemon, you can also add lemon juice and lemon flavouring to get the flavour right.

Serving size

This recipe makes approximately 10 medium sized pancakes (about 8 cm/3 inch wide) and the quantity is suitable for 2-3 people.

Can I scale up or down this recipe?

Yes, absolutely – you are welcome to half the recipe by halving all the ingredients. This would make it a perfect portion (4 pancakes) for one person.

In this case I would either use 1/2 egg if I had any leftovers (or I was planning to make my mini courgette omelettes later) or use the easy egg replacement with vegetable oil, water and extra baking powder (see above).

This recipe is also perfect to make in large quantities – double or triple.

Again double or triple all the recipe ingredients as required. You can just toggle the measurements of the ingredients on the recipe below and it will show you exactly what you need.

If you don’t have more lemons for the zest, you can also use lemon flavouring or add lemon juice to the pancake batter.

I usually find that if I’m making this batch as a double, I try my best to stretch that one lemon to go further by using all the lemon zest, add extra lemon juice in to the batter and use a little bit of lemon flavouring (sometimes instead of the vanilla flavouring).

How to serve lemon pancake recipe

These lemon pancakes are great hot or warm straight from the frying pan served with a icing sugar dusting and a little bit of freshly squeezed lemon juice or the zesty lemon sauce suggested in the recipe card.

These pancakes are also perfectly fine cold (I often take them – with no topping – with me as a snack for day trips out or countryside hikes and they save me from munching on shop bought biscuits!).

You can always warm them up in the microwave again (before you add your toppings, yoghurt, sauces or fruit).

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Toppings & Sauces Ideas for lemon pancakes

The lemon pancakes have plenty of flavour on their own, so you only want to enhance it slightly and enjoy them as they are.

Fresh fruit that goes well with lemon pancakes includes blueberries or raspberries. Stewed pears or pear based sauces or purre would also work great with lemon flavour.

You can also top them with yoghurt, greek yoghurt, cream cheese, drizzle with honey, homemade lemon or lime curd or even lemon or lime marmalade or other pancake toppings.

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Troubleshooting tips

This is a pretty straightforward recipe, so you shouldn’t come across many problems.

The only thing here to remember is that depending on what type of flour and milk you use you might need to adjust the amount of milk to get the right thickness of the pancake batter.

Can this recipe be made in advance?

Yes, you can make your lemon pancakes recipe in advance and then either keep them in the fridge in an airtight container (perhaps stored with baking parchment in between each pancake, so that they don’t stick to each other) for 2-3 days.

How to store lemon pancakes if you have any leftovers

If you do have some leftovers, cover your pancakes with another plate (or place them into an airtight container) and keep them in the fridge for 1-2 days or freeze them on the same day.

I’ve never had pancakes in the freezer for more than 1-3 months, but I’m sure they will probably last a bit longer if needed.

Can you freeze lemon pancakes?

Lemon pancakes are suitable for freezing as there is very little that can go off in these and the texture will also stay the same when they are defrosted (and warmed up again).

If you make far too many pancakes or you can’t finish them in a few days, I’d recommend freezing them.

Providing that you’ve frozen your pancakes correctly (and keep your freezer at a good condition) your pancakes should last up to 3 months in the freezer. They will be probably fine for much longer, but I’ve always eaten them before that time.

Freeze the pancakes straight away after they have cooled down, leaving them on a flat tray (placed in the freezer) and then stack them up with baking or greaseproof paper in between. That way you can easily take them out one by one and have them for breakfast any time you want.

To defrost your pancakes, just take them out the night before you want to use them and defrost them overnight in the fridge. You can also leave them out on a kitchen counter to defrost a room temperature (don’t worry they won’t go off but make sure you eat them on the same day).

You can also defrost pancakes over a saucepan of simmering water or using a microwave or oven (see my notes about heating up your pancakes).

How to re-heat lemon pancakes

I would always heat them up in the microwave or oven (180 Celsius or 350 Fahrenheit for 5 minutes – depending on the quantity) and serve them warm.

Simply microwave the pancakes for 10-20 seconds depending on the quantity. Check after 10 sec and add more time if needed. You can keep them stacked in a 3-4 to prevent them from overheating or burning.

You can also use the oven to re-heat your pancakes by heating the oven to about 180C (350F) for 5 minutes – depending on the quantity and leaving the pancakes to warm through.

If you don’t have access to microwave or oven, you can also warm up pancakes over a saucepan of hot water. I’ve successfully done this when out microwave burned out and I didn’t want to switch the whole oven on to just warm up a couple of pancakes.

To warm up pancakes over hot water, first add some water (1 inch – 3 cm) to a medium size saucepan and place it on a medium heat.

You can get the water boiling if you want, but then lower the heat down to let the water simmer only. Add the pancakes – ideally spaced out) to a bowl or plate and place it on top of the saucepan. If you have something suitable, like a large lid or another light plastic bowl, cover the pancakes to make them warm up quicker.

Let the water to simmer for 5 minutes, by which time the pancakes should be nice and hot. This method will keep the pancakes nice and soft (and not dried out like if you heat them up in the oven).

This blog post was originally written on 17 March 2023 and last updated on 19 March 2023