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I'd like to make pancakes. I have all the other ingredients that I'd normally use (flour, canola oil, sugar, salt, and corn starch) in a pancake mix, but I don't have any eggs.

Can I substitute milk, or more of one of the other ingredients, in lieu of the eggs?

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21 Answers 21

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Ener G Egg Replacer Ingredients: Potato starch, tapioca flour, leavening (calcium lactate [non-dairy], calcium carbonate, citric acid), cellulose gum, carbohydrate gum

Ener G Egg Replacer has always worked well for me. I keep it in the house for times when I don't have eggs on hand and want to bake something.

There is also recipes like this one for vegan pancakes.

1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
2 tablespoons white sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 1/4 cups water
1 tablespoon oil
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What you need to substitute is the binding ability of the eggs. There are a few ways to do this...

There are a variety of seeds that produce mucilage when soaked in water. This sticky substance can work very well to bind baked goods together. To use, you soak the seeds or seed meal in water until the water becomes thick. If whole seeds are used, the water may be heated to speed up the process. Some of the most common seeds that have this characteristic are flax, chia, and buckwheat.

An alternate method that will change the characteristic of your pancakes a bit is to incorporate something that contains pectin. This includes many fruits: canned pumpkin, mashed banana, apple sauce, many jams and preserves, etc. The pectin will serve as your binder.

Some eggless pancake recipes also call for small amounts of corn starch (which has some mild binding abilities) or cider vinegar (which aids leavening and helps to tighten dough, but doesn't really bind on it's own).

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2 tablespoons of APPLESAUCE! An old family trick my grandmother used to use, works magic you cant taste the difference!

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  • Apple butter and prune butter, too.
    – arp
    Jul 13, 2019 at 1:53
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Flax seed soaked briefly in water is a common substitute for eggs.

1 unit flax seed 4 units water

Time: 4 min

Example: Soak 1 tsp of flax seed in 4 tsp of water for 3 to 6min.

Use as you would eggs. Best results seem to be with pancakes. Results mixed for fluffy cakes and baked goods that really need to rise.

I've also had success using the same ratio but with tablespoons.

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    I use ground flax seed. I wouldn't think whole seed would work well. Additionally some use ground golden flax because it looks a bit closer to eggs but I think this is not really that important.
    – John Dyer
    Mar 8, 2013 at 22:49
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    Whole seed does work pretty well, but I've always seen it soaked for much longer or simmered in the water.
    – SourDoh
    Nov 27, 2013 at 17:03
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Vegan chefs also use chia seeds for baking cakes, breads and pancakes. They're the same seeds you use for Chia Pets. You can use them whole or grind them up. Use 1 tablespoon whole seeds or 1/2 Tbsp. ground per egg. Put in a small amount of liquid that is being used in recipe and let soak 15 to 20 mins. It forms a gel that binds like egg.

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    The page you linked to says a tablespoon of meal (ground) per egg, but you say half a tablespoon - which is right? And can you really use them whole as easily as ground?
    – Cascabel
    Mar 8, 2013 at 6:25
  • Web site deleted. The wrong site was chosen. I did indicate whole or ground. Apr 22, 2013 at 22:12
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    Bit late for a reply, but I believe the reason I asked about whole vs ground is that I would expect ground to soak faster than whole. Indeed, I've more commonly seen ~5 minutes when using ground, and more often ~15 minutes for whole.
    – Cascabel
    Dec 4, 2017 at 21:53
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I just made pancakes with a two spoonfuls (i.e. About the same volume as an egg) of jelly and they came out fabulous! Honestly I think I liked them more this way. I used dandelion jelly so it didnt really change the taste, but I'm sure using strawberry or raspberry would give you yummy fluffy flavored pancakes!

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I started pancakes at 5am then realized I was out of eggs. Not wanting to wait for store to open I reviewed all of the answers here and came up with my own concoction that turned out better than anything else ive tried in 40+ yrs of cooking. You probably won't have some of these but may figure out your own substitutes that work too.

For protein I used a tablespoon of powdered chicken bone broth. (A suplement or whatever that came in a big orange container from a health food aisle and was left at my house by a friend months ago.made by Now Sports, is almost pure protein) other protein powders would probably work the same idk.

  1. Drain the water from a can of Garbanzo beans (chickpeas) into a saucepan and heat on low, you just need it warm not hot.
  2. Stir in 3 heaping tablespoons (about 1/3 can) of pumpkin
  3. Add scoop of protein powder and stir

For pancakes thats it. You have enough in that pot to make pancakes all week. I used a 1/4 cup measure to dip out the volume of 1 large egg. Your recipe already calls for oil or butter so no extra is needed. Just add it directly to your bowl like you normally would.Oil + water dont mix anyway If your making something other than pancakes that doesnt call for oil youll need to add some to the recipe to make up for whats not in your concoction.

My recipe is equal parts buttermilk and dry mix with a couple tblsp of oil and a dash of vanilla extract. My dry mix is all purpose flour, baking soda, sugar, salt.

Results: This variant took out all lumps in flour very fast. Not a good sign if you understand that lumpy pancake batter makes the best pancakes. It also required more liquid and I added almost 1/2 cup cold water to make the mix pour. They rose quickly in pan but then settled slightly before they finished. The end result was a perfectly tasting and acceptable pancake. They didnt have the big air bubbles, and were maybe a bit crepe-like. I may make more tomorrow and add a bit more baking soda in an effort to get those bubbles. All in all id call it a success. Not perfect but good enough for me to store concoction in the fridge to be used later.

Thanks everyone for those ideas. Much much better than crushing bananas, applesauce, etc. Just apologize to your guests that the pancakes are an experiment so they don't wonder why they aren't as fluffy as expected.

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I just read that the liquid from canned chickpeas can be used as an egg substitute in recipes. You can even whip it for meringue.

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    – Cindy
    Jun 23, 2015 at 19:40
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    This technique/ingredient is called aquafaba, and is documented in several sources under that name. Jan 18, 2016 at 16:24
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3 tbs of mayonnaise will do the trick.

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  • I find this strange as a suggestion for a recipe where the eggs are used for binding. Maybe you could expand on how it changes the texture as opposed to normal pancakes.
    – rumtscho
    Mar 6, 2013 at 17:06
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    Mayonnaise contains egg, so it's not a great substitute for eggs. Mar 6, 2013 at 18:41
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    @ChrisSteinbach- The asker doesn't have eggs- they might have mayo. If it works this would be a reasonable answer to the question. Apr 22, 2013 at 22:57
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Fine cornmeal, if you have it, can replace maybe 10% of the flour. Probably you'll need a drop more liquid without the egg too.

This will change the flavor and texture of the pancakes, but I have found most folks are agreeable to the switch. Fluffier and drier (soaks up more syrup) vs. rubbery and eggy.

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Chickpea flour (different chickpea product than aquafaba) is commonly used in indian pancakes (besan ka chila - usually mixed with grain flours), and can even be made into a dough that cooks into something not entirely unlike omelette on its own, with just water and seasonings. Other legume flours - soybean flour, lentil flour - are also not infrequently used as binders.

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I understand that this is an old thread but thought will share my two cents because I don't use eggs for pancakes or any other baking which calls for eggs. Like some of the previous chefs have mentioned 1 tablespoon of flax seed meal or chia seed meal mixed with 3 tablespoons water can be used and also mashed banana can be used.

I simply use baking powder in pancake recipes to make it egg free/vegan and it works very well. You can see the full recipe here.

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I used 2 tablespoons of vegetable oil mixed with 1/2 teaspoon of corn starch per egg for a pancake mix and it worked great.

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Deeply-mashed banana—to the point where it's a homogeneous goo—works very well for me.

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most eggless pancake recipes seem to sub eggs for 1 tablespoon of vegetable oil, try that

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I've just made great pancakes using ground flax seed instead of eggs. I just put 1 spoonful in the batter, let it rest a couple of minutes, and it was ready to fry. Great substitute

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I have used 3 tbsp mayo for each egg and also subbed 1 tbsp vegetable oil for each egg. I actually preferred the taste and texture when I used the mayo but the oil will work if you don't have or don't like mayo. Hope this helps! :)

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Apple cider vinegar worked great for me.

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  • Hello, and welcome to Stack Exchange. It seems unlikely that replacing eggs with apple cider in a pancake recipe would lead to anything like success. Mar 6, 2017 at 3:26
  • @DanielGriscom, just to be clear, OP was suggesting apple cider vinegar, not apple cider. Very different things, but agreed that it would be surprising if it worked; cider vinegar has moderate leavening power but not much binding strength. Mar 6, 2017 at 4:38
  • @JohnFeminella Typo on my part: I meant to type "... vinegar"... same conclusion... Mar 6, 2017 at 11:58
  • @DanielGriscom Not the answerer, but I use apple cider vinegar in my pancakes, but more as a way to make vegan buttermilk than to replace the eggs. 1 tablespoon of apple cider to 1 cup of soy milk. Whisk and leave to sit for 5 mins. Combine 1C flour and 1 teaspoon baking powder. Mix in "buttermilk". Cook. Perhaps that's what Nathan meant. (This doesn't answer the question though, as it omits the egg, rather than replacing it.)
    – Fodder
    May 11, 2017 at 3:01
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As I've read the advice, I can tell you that I have used mashed, brown 1/2 banana in baked products, in substitution for one of the eggs called for. I have also done the same with applesauce. Yet I've always used at least one egg in the formula.

I think using either of these two or both, would work for pancakes. I'd suggest maybe adding a little cream of tartar to help the rising stays a little more stable. I've done that with good results for biscuits.

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Mayo didn’t work for me, oil didn’t work for me, but custard powder which is basically cornflour worked beautifully!

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I use applesauce, about 1/4 cup - snack size. They are excellent. I often also add nuts and chopped apple. This was originally because of egg allergy and having applesauce to use. Now this is my preferred method.

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