Vegan Valentine’s Day: PB Pancake Sandwiches + Banana Hearts

Today’s dish is less of a recipe and more of a fun presentation/ yummy ingredient combo idea. Incase you haven’t tried pancakes with peanut butter and banana, you’re in for a treat. These Peanut Butter Pancake Sandwiches with Banana Hearts are perfect for a Valentine’s day breakfast-in-bed surprise or a cute V-day party snack.

For the pancakes in the photos I decided to keep it simple and make them using Bob’s Red Mill Gluten-Free Pancake Mix. The mix calls for milk of your choice (I used unsweetened almond), 1 tbs oil (I used coconut) and 1 large egg, which I replaced with “flax egg.” Flax eggs are a great baking substitute- to replace 1 egg, mix 1 tbs ground flax seed with 3 tbs warm water. Let sit for 10 minutes then mix and use right away!

For the little sandwiches, first I made pancakes that were about 1- 1.5″ wide (1-2 tbs batter). In between batches of pancakes, I sliced a banana crosswise then used a small, sharp knife to cut the slices into heart shapes. After the pancakes were all done, I a little peanut butter and place a (non-heart shape) banana slice on half of them. Then I topped each with another pancakes, added a little more peanut butter and topped with a heart-shaped banana. Voila!

For the larger pancakes with a peanut butter and cacao nib heart, I used about 1/4 cup of pancake batter. Once it was finished cooking, I spread peanut butter on top in a heart shape, then outlined it with cacao nibs.

You can’t go wrong when you put a heart on it, right? What are your favorite V-day treats? Later this week I’ll be posting a recipe round-up of sweet treats and other heart-shaped homemade goodies!