Breakfast Best Buttermilk Pancakes

Aldi is never lacking in convenience foods, and that includes quick breakfast entrees. On mornings when you don’t have time to make pancakes from scratch, Aldi comes through with ready-made pancakes.

Breakfast Best Buttermilk Pancakes sold for $2.59 for a 32-oz. package of 24 pancakes at the time of publication. They’re sold frozen, are fully cooked, and contain no preservatives. They’re advertised as a good source of iron and can be ready to eat in one minute.

One serving is 3 pancakes, and one serving contains 260 calories, 1.5 grams of saturated fat (8% of your total recommended daily value), 10 mg of cholesterol (3% DV), 370 mg of sodium (16% DV), 44 grams of total carbohydrates (16% DV), 12 grams of sugars, and 10 grams of added sugars. That’s all before you add any butter, syrup, or other toppings.

Nutrition information and ingredients. (Click to enlarge.)

The package states the pancakes should be kept frozen until ready to serve, and thawed product should not be refrozen.

You have three ways to heat the pancakes: microwave, toaster, or oven. The microwave is the recommended method.

To microwave, remove the desired number of pancakes from the plastic wrap and place on a microwave-safe plate. Microwave on high until warm. For one pancake, microwave for 25-30 seconds. For two pancakes, microwave for 40-45 seconds. For three pancakes, microwave for 1 minute to 1 minute and 15 seconds. Individual microwave ovens may vary, so these are guidelines only, and overheating may cause toughness.

To prepare in a toaster, set the toaster to a light/low setting. Remove plastic wrap from pancakes, and place one pancake in each toaster slot. Toast for one to two toaster cycles or until warm.

To bake in a toaster or conventional oven, preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Place pancakes on a sheet pan, cover with foil, and bake for 5 minutes or until hot. For a crispier texture, bake uncovered.

The pancakes contain wheat, eggs, and milk.

One of the first things I noticed is that these pancakes seem to have a disproportionate amount of plastic wrap. They are sold in one large plastic bag, but within that larger bag, pancakes are packaged in groups of three in more plastic wrap. With 24 pancakes total, that means there are eight plastic bags inside the large main bag. Maybe this helps with portion control or with reducing freezer burn, or maybe not, but it’s a lot of crinkly wrapping.

The pancakes also are not very large, so you’ll want to eat more than one, and that’s not a big surprise because three pancakes is actually considered one serving.

My family enjoyed Aldi’s pancakes, but we prefer homemade pancakes. Aldi’s pancakes are spongy like you’d expect pancakes to be, but they have a slightly rubbery texture that probably comes from being heated in the microwave. That didn’t stop my kids from devouring them, but it does make them harder to cut into bite-sized pieces. A plus is that these are easy for my kids to pop into the microwave, so they can make their own breakfast on busy mornings.

The Verdict:

Aldi’s Breakfast Best Buttermilk Pancakes taste good and have that classic spongy texture that will soak up all the butter and syrup you put on them. They don’t turn out the same as homemade pancakes, and they are markedly more difficult to cut up compared to the homemade variety, probably because heating these in the microwave turns them a bit rubbery. Nevertheless, my family likes them and they’re easy for my kids to make without assistance, so they’re good for mornings when you don’t have time to cook breakfast from scratch. We do with there was less plastic waste in the packaging.