PANCAKE DAY
Created | Updated Feb 16, 2002
The pancake, as it's name suggests, is cooked in a pan. It is a simple concoction of fried batter that seems to have occurred in some form or other across the whole globe. The French call them crepes which I reckon must mean something like thin and wrinkly (because of crepe paper).
There are plenty of ways of eating pancakes - as many as eating bread - with fillings either spicy, savoury or sweet. Alternatively you can make them extra thick and fling them like frisbees.
I'm sure there are far greater authorities than I on the culinary uses of a pancake so i will elaborate no further.
I would rather elucidate on Pancake Day.
When I was a kid Pancake Day was a lot more important than it seems to be today. Indeed, until relatively recently, we in the UK had an advert for Lemon Juice - "don't forget the pancakes on Jiff Lemon Day" but I haven't seen the advert for a couple of years.
Pancake day is a vestigial remnant of the last great feast before Lent. In other parts of the world it is known as Mardi Gras - Greasy Tuesday and in many places Mardi Gras celebrations are renowned for their extravagance, often including near-nudity and dancing.
We in Britain, with our customary reserve, have settled for a thin disc of crisp-fried batter. The closest we get to bachanalian excess is when we have a pancake race.
A pancake race is basically a bunch of bored people raising money for their local community centre/church roof/needle exchange. They do this by running along a prescribed route holding a frying pan and pancake. The winner is the person to pass the finish line first with - and here's the eccentric genius of it all - their pancake still intact and in their frying pan.
So that's Pancake Day for you - you can keep your Mardi Gras.
Interestingly - as the last big blow out feast before Lent, Pancake Day lands rather conveniently in the calendar at just the time when all the foods stored up for winter were starting to rot. So - it's a big feast of food to eat it while you still can and lent is a hardship you have to endure anyway so you may as well make a virtue of it.
There are plenty of ways of eating pancakes - as many as eating bread - with fillings either spicy, savoury or sweet. Alternatively you can make them extra thick and fling them like frisbees.
I'm sure there are far greater authorities than I on the culinary uses of a pancake so i will elaborate no further.
I would rather elucidate on Pancake Day.
When I was a kid Pancake Day was a lot more important than it seems to be today. Indeed, until relatively recently, we in the UK had an advert for Lemon Juice - "don't forget the pancakes on Jiff Lemon Day" but I haven't seen the advert for a couple of years.
Pancake day is a vestigial remnant of the last great feast before Lent. In other parts of the world it is known as Mardi Gras - Greasy Tuesday and in many places Mardi Gras celebrations are renowned for their extravagance, often including near-nudity and dancing.
We in Britain, with our customary reserve, have settled for a thin disc of crisp-fried batter. The closest we get to bachanalian excess is when we have a pancake race.
A pancake race is basically a bunch of bored people raising money for their local community centre/church roof/needle exchange. They do this by running along a prescribed route holding a frying pan and pancake. The winner is the person to pass the finish line first with - and here's the eccentric genius of it all - their pancake still intact and in their frying pan.
So that's Pancake Day for you - you can keep your Mardi Gras.
Interestingly - as the last big blow out feast before Lent, Pancake Day lands rather conveniently in the calendar at just the time when all the foods stored up for winter were starting to rot. So - it's a big feast of food to eat it while you still can and lent is a hardship you have to endure anyway so you may as well make a virtue of it.
