It’s no secret by now that I love all things pumpkin, which is why I’ve created so many awesome recipes you can come back to every single year when you get that pumpkin-crazed look in your eyes.
Today I’m here to remind you that these delicious healthy pumpkin pancakes exist and are truly the best pumpkin pancakes you’ll ever eat. They just so happen to be gluten free AND dairy free and are packed with pumpkin flavor. Whoo hoo!
This recipe is based on both my banana oatmeal pancakes and my apple oatmeal pancakes, both recipes are made in the blender and require no flour.
Personally, what I adore about these pumpkin pancakes is how perfectly fluffy they are on the inside, plus they’re just the right amount of thickness and are the ultimate breakfast treat with a drizzle of salted peanut or almond butter + pure maple syrup. Highly recommend!
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Ingredients in pumpkin oatmeal pancakes
These healthy pumpkin pancakes are made with simple ingredients and also happen to be an awesome post-workout breakfast because they’re packed with healthy complex carbs and 12g protein per serving. Hell yes! Here’s what you’ll need:
- Pumpkin puree: be sure to use a pumpkin puree that’s just pumpkin (no added sugars, etc.)
- Eggs: you’ll need 2 eggs in this pancake recipe. I haven’t tested these with flax eggs but let me know if you do.
- Milk: I like to use unsweetened vanilla almond milk but you can use any milk you’d like.
- Vanilla extract: for a little boost of flavor.
- Maple syrup: these pumpkin pancakes are naturally sweetened with pure maple syrup.
- Rolled oats: be sure to use rolled oats (gluten free if desired) to give these the perfect texture. Do not use steel cut oats.
- Baking powder: a bit of baking powder will help these pumpkin pancakes get nice and fluffy.
- Cozy spices: we’re using cinnamon, nutmeg, allspice, ground ginger and salt. Alternatively you can sub those out and use 1 1/2 teaspoons of pumpkin pie spice.
Healthy pumpkin pancakes in 3 simple steps
- Make the batter. Place all ingredients into a blender and blend until the batter is nice and smooth.
- Cook them up. Add olive oil or coconut oil to a griddle or large nonstick pan and place over medium heat. Add pancake batter 1/3 cup at a time. Cook for about 2-3 minutes or until golden brown and tiny bubbles appear around the edges. Flip and cook for 2 minutes more.
- Top & devour. Serve your pancakes with pecans, butter (or my personal favorite: peanut butter) and a drizzle of pure maple syrup. SO GOOD.
Try making mini pancakes
I love making these pancakes mini for the kiddos! Simply drop just 1-2 tablespoons of batter onto your griddle at a time. You can also try these baby banana pancakes that are smaller and great for toddlers and babies.
How to keep pancakes warm
Feel free to make these healthy pumpkin pancakes ahead of time and keep them warm in the oven. Simply place oven at 200 degrees F, then add pancakes to a platter or oven-safe plate and place in the oven until ready to serve.
Freezer-friendly pumpkin pancakes
If you’d like to make your pancakes ahead of time and serve them at a later date, you can place the pancakes on a baking sheet so they aren’t touching and place in the freezer for 30 minutes, then place them in freezer safe containers and freeze for up to 3 months. Once ready to reheat, simply add pancakes to a plate and microwave for 30-60 seconds or until warm. I do it all the time!
Our favorite pancake tools
- Blender
- Square griddle
- Spatula (use the code ‘ambitious’ for 10% off!)
See all of our kitchen essentials here.
More pumpkin recipes to try
- Baked Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Oatmeal Cups
- Pumpkin Pie Smoothie
- Healthy Pumpkin Bread with Maple Glaze
- Nourishing Yellow Chickpea Pumpkin Curry with Coconut Brown Rice
- Best Ever Healthy Pumpkin Pie
Get all of my amazing pumpkin recipes here!
I hope you LOVE these healthy pumpkin pancakes as much as we do! I’d love if you leave a comment below and let me know how you enjoyed them. xo!
Ambitious Kitchen
Cookbook
125 Ridiculously Good For You, Sometimes Indulgent, and Absolutely Never Boring Recipes for Every Meal of the Day
Healthy Pumpkin Oatmeal Pancakes
Ingredients
- ¾ cup pumpkin puree
- 2 large eggs
- ⅔ cup unsweetened vanilla almond milk (or milk of choice)
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- 1 tablespoon pure maple syrup
- 1 ½ cups old fashioned rolled oats, gluten free if desired
- 2 teaspoons baking powder
- 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 1/2 teaspoon allspice
- 1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
- 1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- Olive oil, for cooking
Instructions
- Add all of the ingredients to a blender and blend on high until completely smooth, about 30 seconds to 1 minute.
- Lightly coat a griddle with coconut oil, vegan butter or olive oil and place over a medium heat. Once the pan is hot, add about 1/3 cup of the batter to the griddle for each pancake; the batter may be thick so you'll need to use a spoon to spread out the batter a bit. It will get thicker as it sits so be sure to cook these pancakes immediately after blending. Cook for 2-4 minutes until pancakes slightly puff up and you see a few bubbles along the edges.
- Flip cakes and cook until golden brown on underside. If you find that pancakes are browning too quickly, then you need to lower the heat. I normally start on medium heat, then reduce to medium low later so that my pancakes don't burn. If at any point your griddle starts smoking, it means your pan is way too hot. Wipe skillet clean and repeat with more oil and remaining batter. Makes 6 pancakes total. Serves 3, 2 pancakes each.
Recipe Notes
Nutrition
This post was originally published on October 10th, 2019, and republished on October 16th, 2022.
These are absolutely DELICIOUS I make them at least once a week, batter is on the wetter side so you have to be mindful of that when cooking but they always turn out perfect. I’ve been doubling the recipe for meal prep because they stay so well in the fridge/freezer. Perfect for fall, or any time honestly!!!
So happy to hear that! I love these all year round, too 🙂
Would it be a bad idea to prep these the night before? Blend and stick in the fridge till morning?
I’m afraid the batter will get too thick!
Made these to treat Mom for Valentine’s Day – they were delicious! I followed the recipe exactly using whole milk and the taste was exceptional. No tweaks needed.
Thank you for the recipe.
Love that! Perfect v-day breakfast 🙂
Really great recipe. If your diet will allow, I recommend some finely chopped nuts added to the batter. The pancakes would be great with banana, or any fruit lightly scattered on top. This is a keeper.
Thank you for the love on these, Shirley!
I’m obsessed with these right now when it’s -36 windchill in Michigan! I substituted two chia eggs and made them into waffles, easier to freeze. Might add a bit more oat flour next time. The spices are perfect and so warming. Basically my healthy dessert now!
Perfect! So glad you enjoyed!
I love Ambitious Kitchen recipes and have made many with great success. These pancakes were a fail. They need so much more liquid than the recipe calls for. I added another 1/3 cup of milk and they were still thick – pancakes weee doughy and went in the trash. I hate wasting good ingredients – and we were all so hungry. So if you’re going to make these, add as much milk as you need to make sure your batter has the right consistency.
Sorry you had trouble! The reason that your pancakes turned out doughy is because you added too much milk and since there was too much liquid it prevented the pancakes from fully cooking. These are supposed to have a thicker batter 🙂 if anything an additional tablespoon or two of milk would be fine but 1/3 cup is way too much!
Healthy yummy pancakes
Tasted good but I couldn’t get the pancakes to come out of the pan whole. They kept falling apart and becoming mush in the pan 🙁
So strange! Were they nice and golden brown on the bottom? And did you use butter or olive oil to grease your pan?
I can’t think of a time that I’ve left a review on a recipe but here I am. I’m a huge fan of trying new recipes and have a pumpkin pancake recipe but thought I’d try this one in attempt to be a bit healthier.
There were so many things wrong with the recipe that I don’t know where to start. First being laziness, blender pancakes is such a bad idea, if it’s to get the oats to a consistency that works then just say that, I did on my second attempt and then mixed with a hand mixer and the consistency was so much better. The first attempt overheating my ninja blender because the consistency was closer to wall spackle than what a pancake should be. I probably doubled the amount of almond milk from what the recipe called for. Reading some of the comments is funny when someone pointing out that tweaking a recipe doesn’t exactly make it yours, based on the quality of the recipe I’d be surprised if the person that posted this has ever made these. And then attacking the person pointing this out in the comments is kind of funny too. I’ll unsubscribe from your email list now though.
Hi! Sorry to hear that you didn’t like this recipe. I have many blender pancake recipes on my site because I find them even easier to blend and pour (maybe it’s “lazy,” but as a mom of almost 4 kiddos I like to save time where I can). A lot of readers feel the same! You can absolutely use a hand mixer if that’s your preference. How did the texture and flavor come out when you mixed by hand? Did you mix in the whole oats or use oat flour?
This is the ONLY healthy pumpkin pancake recipe that works perfectly every time. Today I replaced 1 tablespoon of milk with olive oil and made mini waffles!! So fun and yum!
Love that idea!! Glad this is a favorite!
A quick and tasty autumn breakfast. Subbed the pumpkin pie spice but kept 1/2 tsp cinnamon. Definitely wait at least 5 min for the baking powder to “activate” and create fluffier pancakes (or use less milk). Very good!
Perfect! Glad you enjoyed 🙂
These are outstanding! My family devoured them, and my 3-year-old ate them for breakfast and then dinner. Super hearty and easy. Can’t wait to make again.
Amazing! Glad they were a hit!
If I could trust anyone for a healthy and delicious recipe, it’s you! These were delicious.
Aw, I’m so happy to hear that! Glad you loved these!
Can this mix be used to make waffles too?
I think they may be too soft! Feel free to try these pumpkin waffles 🙂
I was wondering could you make waffles with this recipe?
I haven’t tested it so I’m not 100% sure! The batter may be a bit too thin.
Thank you for sharing this recipe. I made it and it was delicious. Was a big game changer for me. I am new to being gluten free, and didn’t think I would have anything delicious and comforting again. I was so wrong. Add a few dots of whipped cream and I have my own bit of pumpkin pie.
Absolutely! I’m glad you found this one!
Thank you for sharing this recipe. I made it and it was delicious. Was a big game changer for me. I am new to being gluten free, and didn’t think I would have anything delicious and comforting again. I was so wrong. Add a few dots of whipped cream and I have my own bit of pumpkin pie.
They weren’t my favorite but I’d eat them again. I liked that they weren’t super sweet and didn’t make me feel like I was in a sugar coma afterward. But I did have to add a bit more milk to blend them in my blender, and even then the batter was hard to work with. And the texture just isn’t the same as traditional pancakes – which is expected.
The oatmeal base will make these thicker!
Perfect level of spice, just like pumpkin pie. Great texture and fluffiness, too.
Glad you enjoyed!
I regularly make my kid rolled oat pancakes. I put large flake rolled oats into the magic bullet, blend until fine, add to dry ingredients.
I Do substitute rolled oat flour for a portion of the whole wheat flour used. I Never substitute the entirety. Rolled oats have little to no gluten. That’s great! They’re Excellent Fiber! That’s Also great!
They Do NOT hold together when cooked, unless there is a large amount of Some Other binding agent.
Eggs alone will not do the job. Egg is a fragile binding agent that itself relies on other ingredients for incorporation and strength.
These ugly AI recipes
I think ppl ought to be financially reimbursed for this garbage. What a waste. By the time you got enough ingredients to balance this slop, you’d have enough to feed your neighborhood! And it would cost as much!
Hi! I can assure you that I created this recipe and have been making these pancakes successfully for years, as have hundreds of readers. This recipe only uses oats, there is no whole wheat flour, and the 2 eggs blended with all of the ingredients do hold the pancakes together well. Can I ask what happened with your batter? Was it overly thin? Or did the pancakes not cook properly? Some more details about what went wrong will help me troubleshoot the issues you had.
Really delicious! I was out of allspice and ground ginger, so I used more cinnamon and a pinch of clove. It turned out amazing! I will make them again
Perfect!!
Absolutely delicious! I love that all ingredients go in a blender! Easy cleanup! Pancakes are freezer bound. Love that they are GF! Will be making again for sure!
Love this recipe. Very versatile – I added a little extra maple syrup, some pecans, and poured into a pan for sheet pancakes. With the additions, they don’t need toppings and I can grab as a great snack. Yum!
Perfect! So glad they were hit!
I’m sure I’ve made these before, but it warrants repeating that these are the most incredible fall breakfast! I even added a scoop of protein powder and it didn’t change the texture at at all. I’ve also recently learned I’m allergic to eggs (what??), and flax eggs worked great in this as well. Served with vanilla coconut yogurt, maple syrup, and toasted walnuts! Fantabulous!
I’m so glad those swaps work out well! Such a perfect fall breakfast 🙂
These were the best pumpkin pancakes! Will definitely be making these again!
So glad you enjoyed!
These are so delicious! They are my new favorite pancake recipe! My granddaughter loved them too. She wants me to put white chocolate chips in them next time for her! ♥️
Love that idea! So happy she enjoyed 🙂
The taste was delicious but the batter was so thick and hard to work with. I couldn’t get it to spread out at all. I fully blended in a Vitamix and cooked right away.
This batter will be thicker than traditional pancake batters due to just using oats, but if it’s hard to work with I’d recommend adding a bit more milk next time to loosen it up. That should help!
I loved the flavors so much that I tried the recipe again and they came out much better! I’m not even sure why. I didn’t do anything different but I think my eggs had more whites this time than last time. Batter wasn’t as thick. I still lost a lot of the batter though due to the savage blade on my Vitamix. Makes it impossible to really scrape the batter out of the bottom.
The best pumpkin oatmeal pancakes ever! I made them for breakfast today and I was in heaven. Absolutely a recipe to keep.
So happy to hear that! They’re our favorites this time of year 🙂
These are super healthy but not fluffy pancakes like it says in the description! They’re fun and easy to make in the blender but the pumpkin puree makes them FLAT and DENSE!! I followed the recipe to a tee!
Sorry to hear that! I haven’t run into that issue, so I’m not 100% what could be creating a dense texture. Does the batter seem overly thick after you blend it?
What happened!
Never been this full in my entire 59 years of existence.
This recipe came out great! I added a scoop of vanilla protein powder to add more protein to it and topped with pumpkin whipped cream! Delicious!
I hate making pancakes because they always end up burnt or raw. Do you think I could use this batter in a waffle iron?
Hmm I haven’t tested it so I’m not sure if the batter will be thick enough — let me know if you give it a try!
Really yummy.
I didn’t want to use our blender so I used oat flour instead of oats. I omitted the maple syrup in the batter, used milk instead of almond milk, pumpkin spice in place of all of the spices and did not use salt because I didn’t have it! Because I didn’t use the blender, I mixed the wet and dry ingredients separately, then gradually mixed the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients. I coated the pan with avocado oil spray and after cooking I drizzled the pancakes with maple syrup. They tasted great before adding the syrup as well!
Perfect! So glad they were a hit!
Tried these pancakes and they tasted very bland and unappetizing but got better when I ate them with syrup. Disappointed I wasted time and money making these.
Sorry to hear that! My healthier pancake recipes aren’t meant to be overly sweet like you would get from more traditional pancakes, but that way you can add your own toppings to really make them your own.
Can you use oat flour rather than putting oatmeal in blender?
Yes!
The best pancakes I have had since going gluten and dairy free. I love that it is sweetened with a natural sweetener. I topped it with toasted pecans and raw honey. Absolutely loved them! Thanks for sharing!
So happy to hear that! One of my fav pancake recipes, too 🙂
These are on constant repeat! So easy and healthy. I make them in the evenings and my son eats them reheated for breakfast the next morning, and my daughter likes to pack them in a thermos for school lunch. We add chocolate chips while they’re cooking. Love these!
Amazing! Glad they’re a hit!
I just made these pancakes and they are quite yummy. If you are looking for something ‘like’ buttermilk pancakes, well, keep looking. But these are a tasty, filling, healthy alternative to a morning shake. I did use flax seed eggs and I was happy with the results. I also used oat milk and added an extra tbsp or so as the batter seemed a little bit too thick. Yes, I will be making these again. Thank you Monique, for creating and posting such great recipes!
Delicious! I tweaked it a bit by using roasted pumpkin and oat flour, added citrus zest and fresh orange juice and instead of maple syrup I used a banana and dates. Thank you, I’ll make these again.
Perfect! Glad you enjoyed!
Best. Recipe. Ever. I doubled it and added a banana. Had to add a tad more milk. I used real pumpkin that I prepared in the insta pot first. Aaaaaaammmaaaazzziiinnggg. And easy.
Love it! The perfect breakfast!
Another WONDERFUL Ambitious Kitchen recipe. They are lite & fluffy and oh so yummy!!!
One of our absolute favs for fall and winter 🙂 glad you enjoyed!
I followed the instructions carefully, and the batter was far too thick. None of the pancakes cooked all the way through due to being too thick. This recipe would probably be better with a pancake griddle where you can make the batter thinner and cook all at once.
Hi! With oatmeal pancakes like these you’ll want to make sure you cook them right away after making the batter, and then use a spoon to spread the batter a bit on your pan (indicated in Step 2). That should help!