Ultra-Fluffy Restaurant-Style Buttermilk Pancakes
With just a few simple tricks, you can make the best fluffy diner pancakes recipe at home. These buttermilk restaurant pancakes are thick and fluffy, made using pantry staples, and ready in just 20 minutes!
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We’re huge pancake fans in this house. There’s nothing quite like a stack of my Cousin April’s recipe for thick, fluffy buttermilk pancakes! Add some syrup and butter for breakfast comfort food that makes the whole family happy.
The secret to fluffy homemade pancakes? Buttermilk! The acid in the buttermilk reacts to the leavening agents in the pancake batter, creating air bubbles that make the pancakes tall and fluffy. It’s a simple switch that makes all the difference.
Star Ingredients
- Vegetable oil – The oil keeps the pancakes moist and helps to avoid giving them a yellow-brown color that happens when you cook pancakes with butter. Save the butter to melt on top.
- Buttermilk – The secret to restaurant pancakes is that they’re made with buttermilk. If you don’t have any on hand, you can make it yourself by adding 4 tbsp of white vinegar to a litre of milk, stirring it and letting it sit for about 5 minutes to curdle slightly. It you don’t have white vinegar, lemon juice will also work.
Pancake Toppings & Serving Ideas
There are so many ways to serve these homemade buttermilk pancakes! You can serve them as part of a bigger breakfast, brunch, or breakfast for dinner spread with sausage or bacon, eggs, and other family-friendly breakfast recipes like French Toast Pancakes or Croissant Breakfast Pie.
And, of course, don’t forget the toppings! Here are a few of my favorite pancake toppings:
- Maple syrup
- Whipped cream
- Nutella
- Chocolate or peanut butter drizzle
- Butter
- Fresh berries
How To Make Fluffy Pancakes with Buttermilk
- Start by whisking all of the ingredients together. Let the batter rest for about 10 minutes to give the baking soda and powder time to activate and release gas. This is an important step that you don’t want to skip, as it gives them their fluffy texture and lift!
- Once the batter has rested, add a little vegetable oil or butter to a large non-stick pan over medium heat. I find vegetable oil is the best because it doesn’t burn like butter, which sometimes turns the pancakes an icky black in spots.
- Add 1/3 cup of the batter to the pan and let it cook until the bubbles start to pop up on the surface of the pancake. Depending on the size of your pan, you may be able to cook two pancakes at a time, but I like to stick to one so I can flip the pancakes more easily without making a mess.
- Once the bubbles start to pop, use a spatula to carefully flip each pancake. Let the pancakes cook on the other side for about 30 seconds. Transfer them to a plate and serve them hot with your favorite topping. I am an old school, maple syrup purist.
Storage & Freezing
Store. While these pancakes are always best fresh, you can store any leftovers in the fridge for up to 3 days. Just keep them covered in plastic wrap. To reheat, I just pop them in the microwave or the toaster. But you can reheat them on the stovetop too.
Freeze. These homemade buttermilk pancakes freeze super well. Just allow them to cool, then transfer them to a plastic freezer bag for up to 2 months. To prevent any sticking, you can also flash-freeze them on a baking sheet first. I don’t bother with this step because if they are cool, they usually don’t stick, and if they do, it is more like how hamburger patties stick together, and they aren’t hard to pop apart.
Reheat. Reheat from frozen in the microwave or the toaster and add your favorite toppings. I find that 25 seconds in the microwave, followed by a few minutes in the toaster to crisp the outside edges again, is the sweet spot!
This recipe makes a ton of pancakes and is really what I would consider a double batch unless you are cooking for more than one family. You can easily cut this recipe in half and still have leftovers to freeze. My son loves pancakes, so I like to make this huge batch so I can freeze them for a quick breakfast.
Ultra-Fluffy Restaurant-Style Buttermilk Pancakes
Ingredients
- 3 cups all-purpose flour
- ½ cup granulated sugar
- ½ cup vegetable oil plus a little more for frying
- 3 large eggs
- 1 tsp salt
- 1 tsp vanilla
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 2 tbsp baking powder
- 33 oz buttermilk (1 litre)
Instructions
- Add all the ingredients to a large bowl and whisk together. Let rest for 10 minutes.
- Heat a large non-stick pan to medium heat and add in a little vegetable oil or butter.
- Add a 1/3 cup to the pan. Let cook until bubbles start to pop on the surface of the pancake. Use a spatula to carefully flip and let the other side cook for about 30 seconds. Remove from the pan and transfer to a plate. Serve warm.
Nutrition
Notes
The information shown is an estimate provided by an online nutrition calculator. It should not be considered a substitute for a professional nutritionist’s advice.
Would would be the exact amounts/measurements for only 12 pancakes? So just have the batch?
Thanks!
Yes just half the batch will work but I usually always have extra and they freeze great.
I have been looking for the perfect RESTAURANT STYLE BUTTERMILK PANCAKE and this is it! I’m so glad to have finally found it. They are perfectly dense, fluffy and sweet. Ice found my new go-to pancake. recipe
This worked SO SO well!
I am “breakfast dad” at our house and I have always made it from a box/bag and felt the urge to try homemade today and found your recipe. didn’t have buttermilk so I followed that Food Network link to make it with vinegar. While it was a very large amount of batter (saving some for tomorrow), the pancakes were OUTSTANDING! Thank you for sharing!
You welcome Waid. I usually freeze the extra pancakes and then pop them in the toaster like waffles for a quick breakfast.
This recipe is awful. No eggs in the recipe but eggs in the picture and descriptions. Very confused. Bland. Bland. Bland.
Hi Jennifer, my apologies and thank you for pointing out my error. In the pictures, the recipe calls for 3 large eggs and I have since corrected the recipe card to reflect this. Without the eggs, this recipe will be bland for sure. I hope you do give them a try again as they are really really delicious!