I tried the viral TikTok pancake hack—here’s my honest opinion

In a viral TikTok video that’s been making the rounds, a woman named Alex G (@lilypcrumbs) makes a pretty outrageous claim.

She said she’d “seen these big, fluffy, thick pancakes all over social media,” specifically from hip New York City brunch spot Sunday in Brooklyn. She “wanted to recreate that look of the really fluffy pancake at home.” So she tried out an exciting new way to make pancakes.

Her conclusion: “These were unequivocally the best pancakes that I’ve ever had in my life,” she said in a voiceover while pouring syrup over a plate of them.

I was unequivocally skeptical for a number of reasons. To start with, the pancakes she described looked a little on the burnt side. Secondly, she referred to her way of cooking them as the “no flip” method. That might be solving a problem for inexperienced pancake cooks, but I myself am a practiced pancake flipper — this is a fix for an issue I don’t have.

But anyone who tosses out a “Gilmore Girls” reference in the middle of a cooking video is all right in my book. So I watched Alex’s video a few times, then tried the technique myself.

It’s the technique — not the batter — that matters here. Though Alex G offered her own recipe and ingredients (in the caption below her video), she made a point of saying that any traditional buttermilk pancake recipe works. I was glad to hear that because I’m partial to a particular brand of pancake mix, New Hope Mills (which is what I used to test this method).

And the method is: You melt 1/2 tablespoon of oil and 1/2 tablespoon of butter in an oven-proof, already-heated saucepan over medium heat. Add your batter. When bubbles form, put the whole pan in a preheated oven (375 degrees Fahrenheit) for about five minutes until the pancake is cooked through. Take it out and flip it onto a plate.

Honestly, I found it a little strange that the video made no mention of the Dutch Baby, a German pancake that’s basically what this recipe is making. Dutch Baby pancakes are cooked in the oven like in Alex’s method, though her method does add the step of starting the pancake pan off on a stove burner and then transferring the pan to the oven.

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Anyway, I reminded myself that these were purportedly the best pancakes this woman had ever eaten. So, I got out my oven-proof skillet, prepared my batter, poured it into the pan with the melted butter and oil, and waited for the bubbles to form. After one minute and 23 seconds, they did.

Then I transferred the pan to the preheated oven, set the timer for five minutes and checked on my pancake when the timer went off. Here’s how it looked:

Definitely not done.

So, I slid it back into the oven for another five minutes. That’s when my hungry husband began to ask questions.

“Are you sure you’re doing this right?” he asked. “It doesn’t seem like it should take this long.”

“I’m following the directions!” I replied defensively. But oh, how I wanted to just flip the thing!

A few minutes later, to avoid burning the bottom of the pancake, I had to take it out of the oven. Here’s what it looked like:

It certainly didn’t appear to be “unequivocally” the best, or even just … good. But it did flip nicely onto a plate. I sliced it in half, and indeed, the inside was cooked through. So I knew it was unequivocally edible.

I cut off one-quarter of the pancake and doused it in pure maple syrup. Then we both tried it.

And the verdict was … eh.

My husband said it wasn’t bad, and that it was definitely a change from regular pancakes. I agreed that this pancake had a different, heartier texture than my usual pancakes. With its crispy outside, it reminded us both of a corn muffin.

But will I make this again? Unequivocally, no.

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