I’m planning a proper series of cookery lessons for later in the year. That’ll be the second series of Cooking in the Cave. Really, it’ll be the first proper series since all the other videos weren’t organised into any proper order or format. Along with everyone else in the fat developed world, I celebrated pancake day on Tuesday. The Christians are famous for hijacking pagan festivals but pancake day has got to be the only Christian festival which has been liberated by the people. Hardly anyone understands its purpose, even less follow through.
I would claim that I’m rather good at making pancakes but that’s a bit like saying I’m rather good at putting my trousers on. If you can’t make pancakes that is probably a sign that either you are using the wrong tools or that you are a tool. You’ve got to use a good pan. It must be slippy. People who are wheat intolerant will not be able to enjoy pancakes because the flours they can eat do not bond well for pancakes, as I discovered at the notorious Cardiff Pancake Day of 1993, when a certain Miss Llewellyn insisted that all the pancakes would be made from gluten free flour. All the pancakes ended up in a pile in the back yard.
Recipe
Ingredients
- 500ml semi-skimmed milk
- 220g plain flour
- 4 eggs
- 2 table spoons of sugar
- vegetable oil
- Golden Syrup
- Optional: cheddar cheese
Method
- Sieve the flour. If your sieve is unavailable use fork to remove any lumpy flour. Alternatively skip this step altogether. I only included it to look proper.
- Whisk eggs, milk and flour together in large round mixing bowl until bubbles appear. If your whisking arm starts to ache, you are a wuss.
- Heat pan with a little vegetable oil in it. Keep flames at maximum.
- Pour mixture into pan, tilting pan to allow mixture to cover pan.
- Let mixture cook. Watch it turn from liquid to solid food.
- Pick up edges of pancake with spatchula. Shake pan to check pancake can move freely.
- Toss.
- Cook for another couple of minutes.
- Serve.
- Optional – some people squeeze lemons onto pancakes. This is disgusting. Far better is golden syrup. A Canadian trick is to put grated cheddar cheese into the pancake and then cover that with Maple syrup, which creates a surprisingly good combination of flavour and texture.