Chocolate. It’s what’s for breakfast. It’s even better when paired with homemade salted caramel sauce. This isn’t the type of breakfast you’d make every day, but it sure is a good one when you do. It’s my birthday today and they’d make a nice birthday breakfast. But I made them last weekend and they’re long gone.
The pancakes are light, soft, and fluffy from the buttermilk. They’re anything but lead balloons, a major gripe I have with many pancakes.
And if you can get the pancakes to look like Pac-Man, they taste even better. I loved that game and could play it for hours, but I digress.
The pancakes appear fairly dark because I used Hershey’s Special Dark Cocoa Powder, but they look darker and more intense than they actually taste. I love my dark chocolate, but I don’t want bitter for breakfast. The chocolate flavor is present, but not overpowering. If you prefer to be overpowered, make these.
The salted caramel sauce is the icing on the cake. Or the drizzle on the stack. If you’ve never made caramel sauce, it’s not a biggie. I wrote a step-by-step tutorial with Dark Rum Caramel Sauce. Same thing here, just swapping out rum for a bit of sea salt. Or keep the rum.
When making caramel sauce, make sure you’re organized and have everything ready to go. Read the recipe. Then read it again before you turn on the stove. Make sure you know what you’re doing, where you’re going, and what to look for. The whole process takes less than 10 minutes, but before you start playing around with boiling sugar, make sure your ducks are in a row. And there’s absolutely nothing wrong with Trader Joe’s Fleur de Sel Caramel Sauce.
I kept the pancakes on the smaller side, about 3 inches in diameter, and made 11 pancakes. If you’re keeping them smaller, it’s a 10 to 12 pancake recipe. Or a 6-pancake recipe for larger pancakes. I’m not a good pancake flipper and smaller pancakes are easier and more manageable to flip.
Feel free to double the recipe, and the extras can be frozen for up to 6 months and warmed in the micro. It’s a nice 60-second hot breakfast option for busy weekday mornings. They’re a smidge rubbery when reheated, but it’s very liveable and easy to overlook because there’s chocolate involved. I took some of the extra pancakes and smeared peanut butter on them for chocolate-pancake-and-peanut-butter-sandwiches for lunch boxes. Chocolate pancakes trump bread.
The soft, light, moist pancakes are the perfect sponges for the sweet and lightly salted caramel sauce. Maple syrup of course works too, but caramel and chocolate is a match made in heaven. The caramel is thick, rich, luxurious, and I couldn’t keep my spoon out of the jar.
When I made these over the weekend, they were met with rave reviews from my family.
You can’t go wrong with chocolate for breakfast. Or with caramel sauce.
Enjoy!
Related Recipes:
Strawberry and Sprinkles Buttermilk Pancakes Tried this recipe? Leave a review! Consider leaving a 5 star rating if you’ve made and loved one of my recipes!
The Ultimate Fudgy Caramel Brownies
Salted Caramel Pretzel Blondies
Milky Way Chocolate Cookie Crumble Bars
Dark Rum Caramel Sauce (gluten-free) – A step-by-step guide for easy at-home caramel sauce that can be used on everything from ice cream to apples. Can be made with or without rum, although I recommend the rum. Add salt to taste
Marshmallow Caramel Oreo Cookie S’Mores Bars
Seven Minute Microwave Caramels (gluten free) – Almost too good to be true. The best caramels I’ve ever had and will be the only recipe I’ll ever use or need again
Chocolate-Covered 7-Minute Microwave Caramels
Caramel and Chocolate Gooey Bars (GF with Vegan adaptation) – Caramels, more caramels, and plenty of chocolate and oats are combined in these gooey, sticky, sweet, and texture-rich bars
Nutella Peanut Butter Chocolate Chunk Cookies
Homemade Little Debbie Cosmic Brownies
What’s your favorite pancake recipe?
