Healthy Pancakes Recipe

These past months’ quarantine has changed people’s lifestyles. Starting with being at home, changing everything to be online-based, taking health measures (social distancing), and countless more. The biggest activity trend that people have followed at home is cooking. I got interested in a certain recipe for making healthy pancakes. It involves changing the normal ingredients to healthier options. Given the long process I’ve been doing for this recipe, I chose to enter the back to basics contest because I knew that it is easy and fast to make, the ingredients are easy to find at home, and it is educational. From research, I found that the ingredients I chose, apply to a STEAM format. More involved in the science and nutrition field. Some examples are, using oatmeal flour instead of normal flour will enrich the flavor, change the color of the bread, and also benefits from eating less gluten. Using coconut oil instead of butter helps the body by boosting vitamins and lower heart problem risks. Considering the conditions that everyone is living, I am sure that anybody will enjoy learning a new recipe to do at home.

Ingredients and tools reasoning:

- Oatmeal flour: Have fewer calories and gluten compared to normal flour. Oatmeal enriches the flavor of what is being cooked.

- Eggwhites: Contain fewer calories and is high on protein.

- Banana: Enhances the flavor by making it sweeter because not all healthy ingredients have a sweet taste.

- Coconut oil: It has vitamins and helps lower heart problem risks. It is more efficient compared to normal butter.

- A cup of coffee: It is used to cook the recipe faster in the microwave and also it is comfortable for some people. It is optional for everyone.

Tools:

• 1 Cup of coffee
• 1 Little plate or bowl
• 1 fork
• 1 knife
• 1 spoon
• Measuring cups of; 1, 1/2, and 1/4
• Microwave

Ingredients:

• Oatmeal
• 1 banana
• Egg whites
• Coconut oil
• OPTIONAL TOPPINGS: blueberries, strawberries, honey, maple syrup, jam...

Tools and ingredients:

• Oatmeal
• The measuring cup of 1 cup
• Blender

Pour oatmeal to the measuring cup of 1 cup.

Pour the oatmeal from the measuring cup to the blender.

Let the blender mix for around 30 to 50 seconds until the texture is flour-like.

Grab the measuring cup of 1/2 a cup and the blender

Pour the oatmeal from the blender to the measuring cup

Tools and ingredients:

• Coconut oil
• Coffee cup
• Spoon or knife (optional choice)

Take an amount of coconut oil and fill all the sides of the cup with it. Make sure the bottom part also has it. This is added to not stick the mixture and make it easy to take the bread out of the cup

Grab the oatmeal flour in the measuring cup and the coffee cup

Pour the oatmeal flour in the cup

Tools and ingredients:

• 3/4 of a banana (it can be either frozen or normal)
• 1 Plate or bowl
• 1 Fork

With the fork, mash the banana until it is almost liquid. To make the process easier you can put the banana on the microwave for 10 to 20 seconds to make it softer.

Grab the banana mixture and the cup with the oatmeal and pour the banana in the cup. (Only use half or 3/4 of all the banana mixture)

Tools and ingredients:

• The measuring cup of 1/4 cup
• Egg whites or normal eggs

Pour egg whites in the 1/4 measuring cup

Grab the coffee cup and the 1/4 cup with the egg whites. Pour the eggwhites in the coffee cup.

Mix until the ingredients look well dissolved. (It should look like the picture: the color beige or white. It is fine if it has little crumbles but try to mix as much as possible.) (Sometimes the crumbs dome from the oatmeal that wasn't blended enough, but it is fine.)

If you would like to add more taste and color add some fruits. It can be blueberries, strawberries, etc. (I will be using blueberries.)

Add between 5 - 7 blueberries and mix a little so there are blueberries at the bottom. (The amount of fruit depends on the amount of mixture. In this case, since it is a small amount I added fewer blueberries.)

Put the cup in the microwave for 2 minutes. When the time finishes, leave it inside to cool down for 10 to 20 seconds.

The result after being heated up should look like the picture.

• If it looks really white os beige it is fine. The oatmeal makes it look like that color.
• The reason why the sides of the mixture are like that is for the coconut oil. You can either take it out of the cup or leave it in.
• If it is still raw, put it again in the microwave for one or two minutes.

To add more sweet taste, put some honey, maple syrup, jam, etc. (I used natural honey)

ENJOY!

In case you need more help, here is a video with every step