Are you looking for a sweet lentil pancakes recipe made with red lentils? Imagine a light and fluffy pancake without eggs and milk that contains a natural protein source and only 6 other pantry ingredients. They are essentially vegan protein pancakes without protein powder. The best part is that the taste of the red lentils can be absolutely hidden.

Pink plate with a stack of pancakes topped with black and red berries and maple syrup

If you are looking for more pancake or waffle recipe ideas, you must try these vegan banana pancakes and vegan banana waffles. They are so easy to make. Or go to our vegan red lentil protein waffles recipe as another sweet vegan breakfast option.

Table of Contents hide

1. Why red lentil pancakes?

2. Ingredients

3. How to prepare red lentils?

4. How do you make lentil protein pancakes?

5. Top tips to make them perfect every time

6. Variations and add-ins

7. Topping suggestions

8. FAQs and substitutions

9. More vegan breakfast recipes

10. Sweet Red Lentil Protein Pancakes (Vegan)

Why red lentil pancakes?

We love recipes where you can hide highly nutritious ingredients without altering the taste or the texture of the original dish. Even better if it is a dessert recipe. 🙂 We love pancakes, especially fluffy vegan pancakes. Who doesn’t, right? And what about high-protein pancakes without protein powder? Even more. Hiding red lentils for my picky eaters is just too cunning to miss the opportunity.

But why red lentils? Red lentils are an amazing source of protein, they contain more protein than most other types of beans and legumes. According to Cronometer a 1-cup serving of raw red lentils has approx 46 grams of protein. That’s astonishing.

Apart from that they are a great source of fiber and are high in different Vitamin B and folate. This latter is very important for pregnant and breastfeeding moms. Last but not least red lentils are also iron-, copper-, manganese- and zinc-rich food. If you are on a vegan and vegetarian diet, you often search for iron-rich foods and recipes and red lentils are a great source to incorporate into your diet. For more details read Healthline’s article on lentils.

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Ingredients

In the original recipe from 2018, we used oat flour, but we changed it in this new recipe to the mix of white rice flour and buckwheat flour.

There are 2 reasons for it. Firstly, there are a lot of people who are following a gluten-free diet also avoid oat as they have a reaction to it. Secondly, I find oat flour has a bitter aftertaste even if I add vanilla extract. So I am redeveloping recipes without oat flour.

To make these yummy sweet lentil pancakes for breakfast you need the following ingredients.

Soaked red lentils
White rice flour
Buckwheat flour
Dairy-free milk – We recommend almond milk or cashew milk.
Coconut sugar – We also tested it with cane sugar, but not with any other types of sugar.
Baking powder – Choose one of these gluten-free baking powders.
Apple cider vinegar or freshly squeezed lemon juice – Choose one of these gluten-fee vinegars.
Vanilla extract

Ingredients for red lentil pancakes measured in glass bowls, white flours, powders, brown coconut sugar, milk in a jar, vanilla extract and of course red lentils

How to prepare red lentils?

This vegan pancake recipe contains soaked red lentils (pictured below) as the main ingredient. A lot of people are worrying about lectins in food and asking questions like is it dangerous or safe to eat or how to decrease lectin content with cooking.

My trusted resource when it comes to nutrition is Dr. Greger’s website. He has a short video about lectins in food. In this video, he mainly talks about red kidney beans, but he explicitly highlights the following sentence: “many lectins are non-toxic, such as those from tomatoes, lentils, peas, chickpeas, fava beans, and other common foods.”

However, if you feel that your stomach doesn’t tolerate lectins, you can use cooked red lentils instead of soaked ones to make this vegan protein pancake recipe.

How do you make lentil protein pancakes?

Soak the red lentils for at least 1-2 hours. If you would like to have them for breakfast, then soak them overnight. When you are ready to work with them discard the soaking water.
Add wet ingredients: soaked red lentils, non-dairy milk, apple cider vinegar, and vanilla extract to the blender. Blend it until smooth.
Stop the blender and add the dry ingredients: the gluten-free flours, the baking powder and the coconut sugar (or the sweetener of your choice).
Blend it until nice and smooth like on the below picture. Now, you are ready to heat your frying pan!

A glass blender from above with a yellowish slightly reddish pancake batter

Pre-heat a griddle or a frying pan on the stove top over low-medium heat. To be on the safe side you can coat it with some oil if yours is not non-stick.
Spoon ¼ – ⅓ cup of the batter and cook one side.
Flip when bubbles appear and edges harden.
Decrease the temperate a bit to make sure that the pancakes and soaked raw red lentils are cooked thoroughly.
If both sides are golden brown, they are ready! Cover the cooked pancakes until you’re ready to eat them as they are always better when they are served warm.

Black frying pan with 3 pancakes uncooked

Black frying pan with 3 pancakes with the topped are cooked already

Top tips to make them perfect every time

High powered blender vs immersion blender – If you have an immersion blender only you can use that. The batter may not be as smooth, but if you blend them long enough any small pieces will still cook properly. Pre-cooked red lentils are easier to blend, so you can choose to use that instead of raw ones.
Why do you need apple cider vinegar at all? – If you want your pancakes to be fluffy and light, you need a levening agent like baking powder. It will only react and inflate the pancakes if it is exposed to any type of acid. So you need apple cider vinegar or freshly squeezed lemon juice.
Why don’t you need xanthan gum? – If you use a boxed gluten-free flour mix with xanthan gum, then your pancakes may turn out gummy. As that is exactly what xanthan gum does, makes them rubbery and gummy. While it is beneficial for yeast doughs like pizza, you really don’t want your pancakes to be gummy.
Why are my pancakes soggy? – You probably used high heat, which meant that the outside got golden brown while the inside wasn’t cooked through. Lower the heat then.

Variations and add-ins

This is a simple recipe sweet high protein vegan pancakes recipe that can be a base recipe for endless variations. We have been making them for a long time and had many different add-ins for example

Fresh blueberries – You can add them to the batter and mix it in the bowl. However, what I like more is that I add them while the first side is cooking. Just take a couple and pop them by hand. Then flip. This is to make sure every pancake is loaded with them.
Chocolate chips – I would say it is another obvious choice. Mix in the batter some chocolate chips and go from there.
Any fruit really – You can add any fruit you like. We made them with chopped strawberries, raspberries, mixed berries, shredded apple with cinnamon.
Chopped nuts – Any type you like.
Dried fruits like cranberries or raisins
Citrus zest – Add a tablespoon of lemon or orange zest. So yummy, especially lemon combined with blueberries.
Cocoa powder – Add a tablespoon, if you want to turn them into chocolate pancakes.

Pink plate with a stack of pancakes topped with black and red berries and maple syrup is pouring from the top along the sides.

Topping suggestions

What is the best topping for such delicious gluten-free vegan red lentil pancakes? I would say maple syrup, wouldn’t you? If you have been using honey, please note that it is not considered vegan. Choose any of these honey substitutes where we included homemade vegan honey recipes as well.

Dark brown syrup in a typical maple syrup glass.

There are lots of other ideas though you can try depending on whether you had any add-ins from the above list or not.

Vegan butter with maple syrup
Fresh fruit or fruit sauces (like this quick strawberry puree)
Whipped cream
Vegan chocolate frosting, which is actually coconut whipped cream
Nutella
Banana slices
Chocolate chips or chocolate sauce
Caramel sauce
Toasted walnuts or pecans

Let us know what is your favorite topping in the comments!

FAQs and substitutions

Can I use other flour?

We haven’t tested it with all-purpose or whole wheat flour. If you don’t have rice flour, buckwheat flour, or oat flour or don’t want to use it, try other gluten-free flours, like millet or quinoa flour should work similarly.

Do you need oil?

I tested this recipe without coconut oil or even nut butter and it works perfectly. If you don’t have a non-stick griddle or frying pan, then use a cooking spray to make sure they don’t stick, but you definitely don’t need to add any to your pancake batter.

How to store it?

These vegan protein pancakes can get quite dense and tough after 24 hours even if you store them in an airtight container. We recommend making them fresh right before serving.

You can freeze any leftovers though and pop them in your toaster or back to your griddle. They may get a crispy crust but I quite like them like that. You will get a better result like that compared to the microwave.

This vegan red lentil pancakes recipe is dairy-free and egg-free. It is suitable for a vegetarian, gluten-free, and soy-free diet. This recipe is WFPB-friendly (whole foods plant-based) if you don’t use oil for frying.

More vegan breakfast recipes

Browse through our vegan breakfast recipes gallery if you want some savory recipe ideas, or try one of these sweet breakfasts below.

This pancake recipe was inspired by Nest & Glow’s Lentil Protein Toast.

UPDATED: This recipe was originally posted in July 2018. It has been re-tested and improved in January 2022.

Sweet Red Lentil Protein Pancakes (Vegan, Gluten-free)