Looking for a Valentine’s Day recipe that doesn’t contain food dyes?
Make these delicious and nutritious pancakes for your kids. Love beet pancakes are perfect for Valentine’s Day and don’t contain any food dyes. The pancakes are bright pink because of the beets and contain lots of nutritious ingredients such as beets, a banana, yogurt and milk.
I used Love Beets because they are already cooked and ready to go. Peeling and cooking beets takes a long time, so using already prepared beets makes this recipe super easy to prepare.
According to Allison Topilow, MS, RD, CDN, Nutrition Consultant, beets contain many different vitamins and minerals, along with some fiber. This recipe is a great way to incorporate beets and have little ones try them for the first time.
Serve these pancakes with strawberries (or mixed berries) for extra color and another nutrition boost! Drink with a tall glass of low-fat milk for additional protein.
If you want to make your pancakes fluffier and less heavy, you can reduce the banana to half and increase the milk by 1/4 cup. My batter was pretty thick, which made the pancakes hearty and filling.
Serve with maple syrup on the side or some strawberry jam to make it super pink for Valentine’s Day.
Kid Friendly Tips
Make silver dollar or heart-shaped pancakes for kids! Get your child involved by helping you blend the ingredients together. Get your child to pick her mix-ins. Have fun with adding sprinkles or heart candy decorations.
I don’t like using food dyes when I bake, and have found some great substitutes online at the Natural Candy Store.
Carryover Books
Penguin in Love by Salina Yoon, Pinkalicious by Victoria Gann, Pancakes for Breakfast by Tomie dePaula
Ingredients
1.5 cups all purpose white flour
1/2 cup of raw sugar or granulated sugar
1/2 teaspoon of salt
1 teaspoon of baking powder
1/2 teaspoon of baking soda
1/2 teaspoon of cinnamon
2 large love beets (or two beets peeled and cooked)
1 cup of low fat milk
1/3 cup of vanilla yogurt or plain yogurt
1 banana
1 teaspoon of vanilla extract
1 teaspoon of maple extract (optional)
1 large egg, beaten
1-2 tablespoons of melted unsalted butter
1/2 cup of white chocolate chips (optional)
Preparation
- Whisk flour through cinnamon in a bowl. Set aside.
- In a blender, puree beets, milk, yogurt and banana until smooth. Mix in beaten egg, extracts and melted butter.
- Add wet ingredients in with dry ingredients. Mix until combined. Do not overmix.
- Fold in white chocolate chips.
- Pour about 1/4 cup for each pancake in a non stick pan. I usually use a medium size ladle to scoop out the batter. Cook on both sides until golden brown.
- Serve with fruit. Top with maple syrup. Makes pancakes for family of four. Enjoy!
Becca Eisenberg is a certified speech language pathologist and mom of two.Through her own personal challenges at mealtime with her two young children she ventured on creating a website to help parents facilitate language and make mealtime fun. Her website gravitybread.com focuses on facilitating and encouraging language with fun and easy recipes, educational books and recommended toys and apps.
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