📋 Sheet Pan Carrot Cake Pancake Recipe

carrot cake pancake being lifted off a sheet pan with a blue, yellow and pink checkered tea towel in the background

5 from 1 vote

📋 Sheet Pan Carrot Cake Pancake Recipe

Sheet Pan Carrot Cake Pancakes are not only quick and easy to make, they are delicious. These sheet pan pancakes taste like carrot cake in pancake form with a delicious sweet cream cheese butter topping. Carrot Cake Pancakes are the ideal breakfast or brunch for Easter, Mother's Day or a weekend brunch, or any special occasion!

Course breakast, brunch

Cuisine American, Canadian, North American

Keyword carrot cake, cream cheese, healthy, pancakes

Special Diet Vegetarian

Prep Time 20

Cook Time 18

Total Time 38

Servings servings

Calories 5542kcal

Author Terri Gilson

Equipment

Ingredients

⅔ cup milk
½ tablespoon white vinegar
¼ cup brown sugar
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
3 teaspoon baking powder
¼ teaspoon ground nutmeg
1 ½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
⅓ cup unsweetened applesauce
18 ounce can of crushed pineapple *drained and every bit of liquid squeezed out (I squeeze it through a fine sieve)
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 ½ cups finely grated carrots shredded on smallest setting
⅓ cup chopped walnuts
2 large eggs

Sweet Cream Cheese Butter

1 cup unsalted butter
1 cup light cream cheese 8 oz
3 cups powdered sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Garnish

chopped walnuts
pineapple rings
cinnamon

US Customary - Metric

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Instructions

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F/204 degrees C. Coat a 9x13 sheet pan/baking sheet with non-stick cooking spray ensuring to cover the sides and corners or you can line baking sheet with parchment paper.
Add vinegar to milk and set aside.
⅔ cup milk, ½ tablespoon white vinegar
In a large mixing bowl, whisk together the flour, brown sugar, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, nutmeg
¼ cup brown sugar, 2 cups all-purpose flour, 1 teaspoon baking soda, 3 teaspoon baking powder, ¼ teaspoon ground nutmeg, 1 ½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
In a separate bowl, whisk in the carrots eggs, applesauce, pineapple and vanilla extract.
*Make sure all the liquid is squeezed out of the pineapple
⅓ cup unsweetened applesauce, 18 ounce can of crushed pineapple, 1 teaspoon vanilla extract, 1 ½ cups finely grated carrots, 2 large eggs
Mix wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and mix until incorporated and smooth.
Then pour in milk into the batter and mix until combined. Add chopped walnuts
⅓ cup chopped walnuts
Pour batter onto the prepared baking sheet. Tap the pan on the counter a couple of times to even out the batter.
Bake pancakes for 15- 20 minutes or until a cake tester or toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean and the pancakes are lightly browned on top and golden brown on the bottom.
Optional: Make cream cheese frosting: Beat butter and cream cheese together with vanilla, then slowly add in powdered sugar. Beat until smooth.
1 cup unsalted butter, 1 cup light cream cheese, 3 cups powdered sugar, 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Frost with sweet cream cheese butter. Use a butter knife to swirl it on, frosting as you would a carrot cake. Or simply serve the sweet cream cheese butter on the side.
Garnish with pineapple rings, sprinkles of cinnamon, walnuts and shredded carrots, if desired.
Serve hot or cold.
chopped walnuts, pineapple rings, cinnamon

Notes

Expert Recipe Tips:

- Drain Pineapple Thoroughly. Press the crushed pineapple through a fine sieve and pat dry with paper towels to remove excess moisture. This prevents the batter from becoming too wet and ensures a fluffy texture.

- Use Freshly Shredded Carrots. Freshly shredded carrots provide better moisture and flavor compared to pre-shredded store-bought carrots, which can be dry and tough.

- Toast the Walnuts. Lightly toasting the walnuts before adding them to the batter enhances their crunch and brings out a deeper, nuttier flavor.

- Use Room Temperature Ingredients. Let eggs, milk, and cream cheese reach room temperature before mixing. This helps ingredients blend more evenly and improves the final texture.

- Don’t Overmix the Batter. Mix until just combined to avoid dense pancakes. Overmixing can lead to tough, chewy pancakes instead of light and fluffy ones.

- Tap the Pan Before Baking. Tapping the sheet pan on the counter a few times before baking helps remove air bubbles and ensures even distribution of the batter.

🌡️Storage

Store these fluffy carrot cake pancakes in an airtight container separately from the sweet cream cheese butter in the fridge for up to 4 days.

The pancakes can be frozen for up to 3 months in an airtight container in a single layer, even after being frosted (do not stack them)! If you do plan to heat them up (they can be eaten cold, as well, like a carrot cake), I suggest you freeze the frosting separately.

However, I recommend adding the pineapple rings and grated carrot garnish AFTER it's defrosted. I tested freezing it with the pineapple rings, and it was fine (but the sweet cream cheese frosting was just a bit runnier from the pineapple juice).

WW Points

Because these pancakes don't contain oil or butter, this healthy carrot cake pancakes recipe is Weight Watchers friendly @ 4 WW points per pancake using non-fat milk (and without the sweet cream cheese butter). You can reduce the points in the pancakes by reducing the brown sugar. If you cut the brown sugar in half (to 2 tbsp) the pancakes are 3 ww points each.

The cream cheese butter is quite high (11 ww points per tablespoon) if you use light butter and fat-free cream cheese. The powdered sugar makes it very high in points, but you could use a substitute such as monk fruit. You'll only need ½ the amount of monk fruit (1.5 cups)

Alternatively, you can top these pancakes with a drizzle of maple syrup or a little light whipped cream. This also tastes amazing!

Nutrition