Saturday was one of those, wow, it’s so beautiful and sunny and cool and perfect for fall pancakes and also for a bird to fly right into your glass sliding door and die.
What, you’ve never had one of those Saturdays?
Well, it started like this:
I woke up on Saturday morning with the strong desire for Paleo Pancakes. You know, my favoritist paleoish recipe. All you do is mix 1 banana with 1 egg and 1 spoonful of almond butter to make pancake batter. It’s rather genius and I thank Mark’s Daily Apple for this recipe every night before bed.
I always have almond butter and usually have eggs but I needed a banana. So I went to the grocery store and what do I see? Dozens of bunches of green bananas. Great for a girl with a few days to putz around waiting for bananas to turn yellow. But I was hungry NOW.
I contemplated going to Starbucks and buying one banana for like $16, but on my way I got a seedling of an idea. What could I replace banana with that would also be fallish and wonderful? Apple sauce? Too thin. It needed the consistency of a banana. Apple butter? Hmm.. but is that too many butters? Canned pumpkin? CANNED PUMPKIN!!?!?! OMG I’m the smartest person alive!!!!!!!!!!!!!
So I get about here in my pancake making process and SMACKOBANGO. Whaaaaat was that? But deep down, I already knew. I walked over to the sliding door and there, on the ground, was a bird. He wasn’t dead yet, but I’m pretty sure his neck was broken. So I did what any normal person would do. I took a picture of it.
And then I opened the door and sat on the edge and talked to the bird for awhile. I talked about life and how it is just too short and how you never know if you’re just going to go out to get a pack of cigarettes for your bird wifey, or if you’re going to fly straight into someone’s glass sliding door. You probably didn’t even kiss your bird babymama and three squawking kids before you left. Do you have any regrets, bird? What would you have done differently? Worn sunblock? Made peace with your father who left you in the nest to fend for yourself? Started that tree house coffee shop? He stared at me for a long time saying nothing. I walked away to finish my pancakes. What? I needed to finish them. Life’s too short, remember?
I went back to check on the bird several times. He moved from the door to under the table. It was weird. I’ve never watched anything die before. I stacked all my pancakes up on a plate to bring outside. And guess what? Bird was gone. Poof. I’d like to think I gave him the strength for one last flight home. Maybe he picked up flowers for his boo on the way. Or worms for the bubs. Maybe he had a miraculous full recovery.
I ate my pancakes and vowed to do two things: always kiss people goodbye before I leave the house, and try to leave more streaky marks on our glass sliding doors.
Because in reality, he probably got eaten by another bird while I was pouring syrup on my pancakes.
This post is dedicated to Bird.
May the wind always be at your back
And a glass sliding door not be at your front.
*After several comments, regarding these pancakes, I decided I’d add a few notes below.
Dear anyone who has stumbled upon my blog to make these pancakes,
This post was meant to be more of a story than a recipe post. I did not intend for people to read this post and assume I was giving instructions on cooking these pancakes. For that, I apologize that any way this post was read, led you to follow this story into the kitchen.
I did not give time, heat, or measurements in this post, so when people comment saying THIS DIDN”T WORK, I can only say that I don’t know what you gathered from a story about a dead bird that led you to creating these pancakes at all.
I did, however, answer some questions in the comment section below, but again, I was not thorough in my detail.
Soon, I will attempt to make these pancakes again, and when I do, I will keep track of exactly how I made them, for those interested.
Meanwhile, one comment below is very detailed and may be useful to readers looking to create these pancakes.
I apologize for any misunderstanding, and also, to several people, for the complete missed point of this post.
Sincerely, The Paleo Project
I’m going to pee my pants at work right now.
I agree.
Poor bird… love your poem to him.
AND… I LOVE this recipe!! Thank you for sharing!! Now I know what I’m having for breakfast tomorrow morning… a little tired of eggs and bacon, so pumpkin should do the trick!
i had no idea a recipe for pancakes could be so moving and yet disturbing at the same time. i think you made the right choice by abandoning the bird in its time of need to get on with the pancakes.
Actually…. Your bird probably was just stunned for a bit and flew off. Course that’s not to say he didn’t suffer traumatic brain injury and later forget he was a bird instead of a unicorn.
True that!
Now that I have stopped giggling, how much canned pumpkin did you use??
1/2 can per banana and spoonful
Thnx for the ratio
And I really meant, 1/2 can of pumpkin per egg and spoonful of almond butter. I’m confused. It’s monday.
Thank you for this! I live in Phoenix so I have to really make an effort to celebrate fall, which I still long for in ways I can’t describe. These pancakes should help a lot! Your blog is so cute, I’m so glad I subscribed!
Thanks Jamie!! I’ll put autumn in a box and over night it to you if you’d like!
Honestly…something soooooo not right in there!!! Dying right now!!!!
Looks ahmazing! I have to say I am in love with your site. I am making your cinnamon chicken roast as we speak. It is SO great to have someone else out there who eats paleo and loves the exact same foods as me. I will be making these pancakes this weekend!!!
Thanks Jessica!! Post photos of whatever you make on my FB page. I haven’t made that chicken in too long!
Easily the funniest post I have read in a while. Not only was it funny, but it contained a recipe for pancakes which is probably the next best thing to chocolate covered bacon. Now I must muster up enough juice to go write a new post and reclaim the throne of the “wittiest Paleo blog” that noone visits but I pretend like they do. Game.Set.Match.
hahaha great post!! Although, do birds eat other birds? I want those pancakes sooooooo bad!!!!!!!!
Just made these yesterday and LOVED them! Great easy recipe, thanks for sharing.
So that was horrid. First, they didn’t blend at all so I had to hand mix them. Then I placed them on the burner on low heat and they were very small (they burned.) When I went to flip them, not only were they brown, or black, but they fell apart and came in peices. So I thought, okay that is fine, they will taste good. It tasted like I was eating plain pumpkin, which I don’t really mind, but I thought I was making pancakes. So for breakfast I had plain pumpkin and a banana with maple syrup. What a waste of ingredients, and calories. Didn’t even enjoy them. Guess I am still on the search for the erfect paleo pancakes. *sigh*
I do enjoy the rest of your blog!
Kelly first I apologize that it didn’t work out for you. I actually hear that a lot! And maybe because we have been toying with the recipe for so long we have finally got our groove down. But it is a trial and error process with heat and time and ingredients. I hope you do figure it out nor perhaps share a recipe that does work for you. Have a good one. Jenna
So I’m a terrible cook. Can you please break down the recipe for me?
3 eggs, 1/4cup almond butter, and how much canned pumpkin?? Please help! I’m new to Paleo, and really need a pancake breakfast!!
Hey Darcy… not sure where the 3 eggs, 1/4 cup of almond butter came from….
It’s 1 egg, 1 spoonful of almond butter, 1/2 can of 15oz can of pumpkin.
3 eggs, 3 spoonfuls of almond butter, 1 and 1/2 cans of canned pumpkin.
How much is a spoonful of almond butter? One serving (~190 calories)?
About 2 tbs, I suppose.
I tried this this morning and, like several others, mine didn’t work out but I think I know why, so thought I’d share.
The recipes for these three ingredients all say “mix,” which is a pretty broad term. Not wanting to wake others in the house up this morning, I just mixed by hand, which resulted in a thoroughly blended, but heavy batter that didn’t cook through and fell apart in the pan.
When you “mix” these, the blender, electric mixer, immersion blender, etc. is important, here. Since you aren’t using baking soda, self-rising flour, or the other ingredients that typically add air and lightness to pancakes, you have to manually incorporate that air yourself. So if you tried these and found they didn’t work, give them another shot with the blender (I prefer an immersion blender) to whip a little air in there. You should see bubbles in the batter (like in Jenna’s picture above).
The added air will make the batter lighter,which will allow it to cook more quickly and evenly without burning, and will also allow the cakes to be lighter so that they don’t tear apart as easily when you try to flip them.
I have added some notes in the post, after several people have complained about the outturn of their pancakes. Thank you for your detailed comment, and I’m certain many readers will find it useful.
Happy to help.
Also, to shed some light on why people might be confusing your bird story with a recipe, when you google “paleo pumpkin pancakes,” your post comes up second. A search for “paleo pumpkin pancake recipe” brings you up fourth. Since your post is titled “mini pumpkin paleo pancakes” (rather than, say, “dead bird hit my glass door,”) and gives a lot of pictures and a list of ingredients, however vague, Google’s SEO fun times algorithm is essentially telling people “this is a post about making pancakes” rather than “this is a story about a bird with pictures of pancakes.”
I found the link to Mark’s Daily Apple (a recipe that has been met with the same hit or miss response from those who have tried it) and, like you, thought “ooh, pumpkin! That would be good.” So that’s how your post came up.
I am sorry you’ve received some rather terse comments (“horrid”? Wow, that’s harsh.) on what was supposed to be (and was) a fun to read post. I hope my comment will at least help assuage some of those “this didn’t work and it’s all your fault” responses in the future. After all, obviously they worked for you, and look delicious, so how is it your problem if others couldn’t replicate your success the first time.
Did.Not.Work. I mixed one egg, one scoop of almond butter, half can of pumpkin and added pumpkin spice, stevia and vanilla. I put coconut oil in my pan poured a small amount of the batter in. It not work even a little bit. I didn’t want to waste the rest of the “batter”, so I added another egg and a little almond flour to it and just scrambled the mixture in the pan. Once I figured it was ‘done’ I scooped it into a bowl, topped it with a little maple syrup and ghee and ate it as a breakfast pudding (or hot cereal?). It actually wasn’t terrible. If I had had some chopped almonds, I would have tossed those in for texture. I have no clue how you made these into actual pancakes as pictured. On the plus side, my belly is full and I guess that’s what matters.
Tammee, I have added some notes to this post, after you and several others mentioned that these pancakes did not turn out as planned.
Thanks for the reply! No worries, like I said it sure filled my belly anyway. I ate my pumpkin “pudding”
at 10:00 this morning and now it’s 6:00 and I’m still not hungry…and it tasted good, even if it didn’t turn out to be in the right format 
I’m glad that I stumbled upon your blog and it looks like we have quite a few things in common 
Can you subsitute the almond butter for sunflower butter? I just would like to know if it would work the same.
Love your blogs. Really brightens my day
I’ve never used sunflower butter, but if you usually have no trouble subbing it in recipes, I’m sure the same goes for this one! Let me know