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In another life I would make an awesome private investigator. My google search skills and facebook stalking abilities are on point. I’m not entirely sure that these are qualities I should be bragging about, but it’s the truth.
In many ways these skills have benefitted my food blogging career (is it a career?). Part of running a successful food blog is having a good understanding of what recipes people are looking for. Even though it is my taste and cravings which ultimately drive the content, if people are absolutely repulsed (aka has zero google searches) by blueberry and bacon encrusted chickpeas (ha!) then it might not be the wisest thing for me to post this.
Being able to manipulate google and all of its various programs has been surprisingly important in the growth of THM.
One of my fav google programs to use is google trends. I would never call myself a trendsetter but instead am a very proud trend-follower. I like doing research on what’s on the rise and could legit spend hours comparing various trends from fashion colour-blocking to chia pets to kale.
When I had too much time on my hands over the holidays aka the only Jew not at the movies on Christmas Eve I had a solid google trends session and boy did I discover some interesting things. It turns out our interest in hamsters has increased 90% in the last 10 years, about 1 person searched for “myspace” in the past year and paleo is all the rage these days.
Now I could have told you that paleo has been gaining popularity in the past few years but I clearly didn’t realize how much until google trends enlightened me. Vegan, gluten-free and basically every other diet out there has nothing on paleo.
Good thing I like paleo recipes! Now you guys know I do not follow the paleo diet (you can read about my experience following it here) but I am certainly open to it. If you exclude the grains, legumes, white potatoes and tiny bit of dairy I eat, I am basically paleo (kidding). Then again if I could live exclusively off these Paleo Mexican Hot Chocolate Pancakes with Salted Dulce de Leche, then I would become paleo in a second.
They’re fluffy like classic pancakes and topped with my deceptively milk-free salted dulce de leche . If these don’t start trending then I’m resigning my position at THM (self-proclaimed kitchen destroyer, food pornographer and writer extraordinaire) and taking up that career in private investigating.
Paleo Mexican Hot Chocolate Pancakes with Salted Dulce de Leche
- Prep Time: 1 hour
- Total Time: 20 minutes
- Yield: 8 pancakes 1x
Ingredients
For the pancakes:
- 1 cup almond meal
- 3 T coconut flour
- 3 T unsweetened cocoa powder
- 1/2 tsp cinnamon
- 1/8 tsp cayenne pepper (more for spicier)
- 2 tsp paleo-friendly baking powder
- 1/4 tsp sea salt
- 1 cup unsweetened almond milk
- 2 eggs
- 2 T maple syrup
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- coconut oil for pan
For the salted dulce de leche:
- 1/2 cup dates (soaked in hot water for at least 1 hour)
- 1/4 cup unsweetened almond milk
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 1 tsp melted coconut oil
- 3/4 tsp sea salt
Instructions
For the pancakes:
- In a large bowl combine the almond meal, coconut flour, cocoa powder, cinnamon, cayenne pepper, baking powder and sea salt.
- In a separate bowl combine the almond milk, eggs, maple syrup and vanilla extract.
- Add the wet ingredients to the dry until well-combined. Let sit for 5 minutes so coconut flour can absorb the liquid.
- Heat a large pan or pancake griddle to medium heat and melt coconut oil (about 1 tsp).
- Add 1/3 cup of batter per pancake and let cook for 3 minutes or until all bubbles have popped and rim looks cooked.
- Flip and cook for 1-2 more minutes.
- Repeat process until all pancake batter has been used.*
For the salted dulce de leche:
- Strain dates and add to a food processor or blender.
- Add in all other ingredients and blend on high until well combined. Add in more almond milk to thin out if you prefer a thinner consistency.
Notes
*if pancake batter becomes too thick (different coconut flours are more absorbent) just add in more almond milk by the tablespoon. Batter should be thick though.
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WHOA! Those pancakes have me drooling all over the place, Davida! LOVE the photos, too!
Not gunna lie my private investigating skills are on point, lol! Mmmm these look delicious however I am not a big chocolate fan… but that Salted Dulce de Leche… yes sign me up!
Loved reading this whole post! We would totally be great PI partners because my stalking skills are top notch, and my obsession with Google search trends is on another level… but more importantly, these pancakes look BOMB. Anything chocolatey and breakfasty and I am 110% in. PS I will have to start adding Paleo to more of my tags and recipe post titles… Good tip girlfriend. Xox
girlfriendddd I could go on and on about SEO and paleo for dayzzzz. I may as well start tagging everything as paleo since apparently that’s the only thing people are searching for haha (as I eat a very much unpaleo blondie).
These pancakes are killer! I know what I’m doing this weekend…
I’ve run through a few of my topics (and planned topics) on google trends and mostly get blank pages. I’m not too concerned about it now, but I agree that researching the trends is a great idea, even if not to help come up with topics, its great for wording and coming up with titles. I wonder if non-trending topics are easier to get ranked, since there’s less competition… at least for someone thats just starting out.
We need to chat all about google keyword planner! It’s like a more in-depth google trends! Let’s get together!
That would be great! I’ve played keyword planner a bit for another project, but there’s so much to know with all this SEO stuff, just starting to scratch the surface. Let me know if you’ll be covering it in our nutritionist/blogging session or if we can meet up another time. Would love to chat with you about it!
I actually just started using google trends. I really don’t understand some of the things people search for… some of it makes me kinda sad. playing around with my new honey roasted carrots recipes, I found honey boo boo popping up. that show makes me fear humanity sometimes.
so strange! People look for the weirdest things!
Whoa, these pancakes look amaze 🙂 So much healthier too!
thank you!!
Thank goodness Saturdays are meant for pancakes – can’t wait to make these!
and sundays too 😉 Enjoy, love!
I am making these this weekend! They’ll be post-long run treat 🙂
P.S. Could you do a Google trends how-to? I tried setting it up for myself but don’t think I did it correctly. Thanks!
do you mean google adwords??? Not much to set up on google trends, you just enter in search terms and see how they’ve been trending! For google adwords it does take a bit of maneuvering. I’d be happy to do a post on it 🙂
Those pancakes are the definition of perfection. And the salted caramel is the cherry on top. Do you know of any substitutes for the coconut flour?
I don’t love recommending a substitute for CF since it is such a unique ingredient and is super absorbent but sometimes I have success replacing it with ground flaxseed. It may be a tad runny though so if you do sub flax, I would decrease the liquid slightly! Enjoy 🙂
Holy cow that looks amazing! May be the best pancake flavor I’ve seen. I’ll have to make these ASAP! 🙂
Enjoy, lovely!