Happy Pancake Day!

Today is Shrove Tuesday, but since I’m not religious and have no intention of partaking in Lent tomorrow… I instead chose to celebrate a different tradiction invented for this day: PANCAKES! I know a person really doesn’t need an excuse to make pancakes these days, but it doesn’t hurt to have one handy. The pancake has a very long history and featured in cookbooks as far back as 1439… so its a great food that I think deserves to have a day in the sun, especially since they are shaped like them too!

One cool timbit I came across when looking into this: in England there are several celebrations on this day but perhaps the best known one is the Pancake Day Race at Olney in Buckinghamshire. This race has been held since it’s first running in 1445. The race came about when a woman cooking pancakes heard the shriving bell summoning her to confession. She ran to church wearing her apron and still holding her frying pan, and thus without knowing it, started a tradition that has lasted for over five hundred years. Weird, but interesting. Another interesting pancake timbit: legend has it that Napoleon, who liked to make pancakes and eat them with Josephine, blamed the failure of his Russian campaign on one he had dropped years before at Malmaison during Candlemas. Maybe someone else could use that as an excuse for not finding any weapons of mass destruction…

Because of how easy it is to bake these buggers on hot stoves or griddles, it has resulted in a variety of pancakes around the world. Old English batter was mixed with ale. German and French pancakes, leavened by eggs and much beating, are baked very thin and served with sweet or savoury fillings. The French crêpe is thin and crispy – a crêpe suzette is folded or rolled and heated in a sauce of butter, sugar, citrus juice, and liqueur. Russian blinis, usually prepared with buckwheat, are thin, crisp pancakes, and commonly served with caviar and sour cream or folded over and filled with cream cheese or jam. Mexico has its tortilla, which is often served folded over a bean or meat filling and topped by tomato sauce. The pancakes of North America are thicker and are sometimes called battercakes, griddlecakes, or flapjacks and are usually leavened with baking powder or baking soda and served with syrup.

In conclusion, I love pancakes and I’m sure many others do as well since this is a very popular tradition. I happen to have the day off today, so I thought it would be the perfect time to do something fun and delicious for the boys. So regardless of this days origins, I took the time to make some pancakes for the boys and celebrate a great pancake day together! Here are some pictures of us eating our pancakes and having a grand ole time! Hope everyone had a good Pancake Day and I’ll be around… maybe.

Peter

(The end result. Hmmmmmmm… Pancakes!)

(Thick, soft, covered in syrup and ready to be wolfed down!)

(Here’s one happy camper. Ethan loving his pancake…)