Breakfast pancakes GF, DF

Good mental health is also about eating well.

Some of you may have realised that your body and mind do better when it doesn’t consume certain products - such as gluten or dairy. There is some evidence that consuming gluten or dairy can be detrimental to some mental health conditions.

Many of you have asked - and it’s taken me a while to perfect these - but here is THE recipe for the ultimate breakfast pancakes.

These delicious breakfast pancakes are a nice alternative to the traditional flour-based pancakes that we grew up with!

They are gluten-free, dairy-free, sugar-free and quite simply delicious. I have them every weekend almost without fail.

You can smother then in 100% pure maple syrup if you wish - but I usually simply defrost some berries, warm them a little and pour them and the juice over - and that is sweet enough. Currently it is summer and berry season - so fresh berries are the go to.

I usually add a dollop of coconut yogurt on top, but you could add cream cheese, cream, plain yogurt (for those dairy tolerant).

Also, in the actual mixture - you can play around with the extra flours added - I’ve added apple flour, coconut flour - and at times have added some grated apple to give it some extra zing.

The mixture can be doubled, or tripled, you can add extra milk of any kind or flour if you want to make it ‘go a little further’.

Unlike usual pancakes - the mixture needs to be thick (more like pikelets) otherwise they will fall apart when you try to turn them over. (They don’t have gluten which would normally hold the mixture together.) Use a very fine spatula when turning them over - they are delicate - but you will get the hang of it eventually!

Ingredients for one-two people (makes about 6 small pancakes):

• 1 overripe banana

• 1 egg

• a good splash of vanilla essence

• 1/4 -1/3 cup almond meal

• 1 flat teaspoon baking powder

• 1 tablespoon (adjust as necessary) of buckwheat flour

Method:

• Mash the banana in a bowl so that there are hardly any lumps

• Add egg. Mix well.

• Add vanilla essence

• Add almond meal and baking powder and mix well again

• Gently add in the buckwheat flour

Cooking:

• Use your best non-stick pan - place on medium-low heat. Because of the nuts - these do burn easily - so no high heat.

• Put in your preferred oil or butter

• Put a tablespoon or so of the mixture in the pan per pancake

• Wait until small bubbles appear on top - then very gently ‘flip’ to cook on the other side.

• Top with your very favourite toppings!

Enjoy!

If you are interested in knowing more about how food can impact our mood - you can download this Nutrition & Mental Health PDF here, read this blog here, or do an online course (designed for health professionals) on Nutrition and Mental Health here.