These apple carrot cake pancakes are topped with a maple cream cheese sauce. They’re hearty, warming and perfect for fall.

Here are the foods in every category I can think of that wouldn’t phase me in the least if I never ate them again.

Meat: chicken

Vegetable: peas

Sweets: candy (like the sugary, corn syrupy kind)

Grain: couscous

Nut: peanuts (as a nut, not as butter and I know it’s a technically a legume but let’s just pretend it’s not)

Legume: black beans

And lastly,

Fruit: apples

Apples are just so boring in the realm of fruit.

I’ll give Honeycrisp it’s deserved praise and say it is far superior to the rest but up against a peach, any berry and even a banana I have to say sorry, apple, I’m just not that into you.

The fact that I live in a place that refers to itself as The Big “least favorite of all my fruits” probably adds to my distaste for the state now that I think of it.

That said, it’s apple season and I live with someone who happens to think the exact opposite about the place of the apple in the ranking of fruit (he’s wrong, as usual) so our fridge is full of them.

When the idea of carrot cake pancakes came up, I knew I wanted to make a seasonal variation of them.

And while I’ve been apple bashing for a few paragraphs now, I have to say, they’re really the perfect addition to a hearty carrot cake batter.

They add sweetness and texture that works really well with the carrots and spice. Either that, or my brain is just clouded from the memories of the cream cheese topping.

Because does it even matter what’s underneath when it’s doused in a maple cinnamon cream cheese sauce?

The pancakes are dairy free thanks to Silk, the topping is obviously not. I’m cool with this as dairy isn’t a thing I have to avoid.

If it is for you though, I think trying a cashew cream sauce using maple syrup, cinnamon and almond milk would be pretty spot on like in the recipe for these paleo carrot cake cookies. I freakin’ love cashew cream, I just never have the foresight to soak nuts overnight. Or, try the vegan cream cheese option from these healthy carrot cake cookies.

For more fun fall-inspired pancake recipes, try these sweet potato chocolate chip pancakes, these apple spice pancakes or, these cinnamon pear pancakes.

I’ve got a handful of pumpkin pancake recipes to try too:
Pumpkin protein pancakes
Pumpkin paleo pancakes
Oatmeal pumpkin pancakes

And don’t forget this great base recipe for protein pancakes! With 30g of protein per serving, they can’t be beat.

Silk is also non-GMO verified and gluten free, so if you use a gluten free flour (I LOVE Bob’s Red Mill gluten free all-purpose flour), this will work for a gluten free diet.

This conversation is sponsored by Silk. The opinions and text are all mine.