Arrowhead Mills just misses the target with gluten-free Pancake & Baking Mix

Product: Arrowhead Mills Gluten-Free Pancake and Baking Mix – $4.99+

Nothing screams delicious, carb-a-licious breakfast like pancakes and waffles, right?

Right.

And they are two of my favorite breakfast foods to this very day.  Seriously.  There is just something so comforting about tucking into a small stack of pancakes or a fluffy, toasty waffle.  Especially when you can make them yourself instead of buying them frozen and simply reheating.

This past weekend and then yesterday morning, I got to try out another gluten-free pancake and baking mix, which I had tucked away in my pantry.  As I had just used up the last of my previous one, it looked like Arrowhead Mills was next up in the queue.  I packed this up to travel to St. Louis with my roommate and I.  I was going to do up a batch of Nutella Waffles on Sunday morning for the two of us and her aunt.  Because in the morning…I naturally make waffles.

Then, yesterday, I had just enough left in the bag to put together a blueberry pancake breakfast for my roommate and I.

So, how did Arrowhead Mills stack up to the competition?

Well, it was…okay.

Just okay.  I found that both the waffles and the pancakes had a bit of a grainy texture to them when all was said and done.  And, trust me, I mixed the hell out of both of them.  The waffles did cook up crispy in the waffle maker, so that was good. But they just seemed really grainy as compared to times I have made them in the past with either a gluten-free all-purpose flour or another baking and pancake mix.  But, I figured it might have just been something wrong in my pre-measured additions (salt, sugar, baking powder), which I packed together and pre-measured for simplicity in travel.

So, yesterday I got out my skillet and decided that, as we had poached eggs with dinner the night previous, I would bypass the eggs that morning and run with some pancakes.  I even had some frozen blueberries in my fridge so I decided to dress them up with some fruity goodness as well.  I measured out exactly one cup of Arrowhead Mills Gluten-Free Pancake and Baking Mix and then added, according to the package, honey, oil, an egg, and then a very scant amount of unsweetened almond milk.  It was really, really doughy when I got that all mixed together, so I added some more almond milk until I got it to a good consistency.  In went the blueberries and then…onto the griddle.

One thing I will say about this mix is that it browned up beautifully on the skillet.  Sometimes the pancakes just don’t brown up uniformly or cook way too fast.  But not these.  Not yesterday.  That’s a good thing.  I did find that these did make very fluffy, bulky pancakes by comparison.  So, that was interesting to note.  I gave them a flip, let them cook on the other side, plated them, drizzled with some warm, gluten-free maple syrup and…breakfast was served.

Again, I found that these pancakes, as compared to the other times I have made gluten-free pancakes (with various mixes and flours again) had a grainy consistency.  In fact, my pancakes sort of crumbled as I cut into them.  The flavor was good, but the texture just was off for me.  I don’t know if I should have added more almond milk (even though I had already added more than the package said) or what.

While I do appreciate the fact that Arrowhead Mills makes their gluten-free baking and pancake mix with organic ingredients, for me, in the end, it just didn’t come together, leaving both of my favorite breakfast products tasting as though they had grainy bits of sugar lurking in them.

I might give this brand another try…maybe do up muffins and see how that works.  But as of the moment…it just hasn’t won me over.  And that’s too bad, because I had gone into baking with this brand with such high hopes.