THE HISTORY OF PANCAKE DAY
Why make pancakes on Pancake Day? If you are religious, it is a religious Christian custom to give things up for Lent. You give up goodies for Lent by having them for the last time the day before, called Shrove Tuesday.
I watched a Discovery programme about the Ten Plagues and Pharaoh and the death of the first-born. Detectives were brought in to analyse why the firstborn died. Impossible for assassins to have entered every house, undetected, and never to have killed anybody else. That leaves disease and poison. Poison could be deliberate or accidental.
Why would a poison affect the firstborn more than others. Firstborn are older, often one year, two years, or four years older. They are given double portions, the only portion if there is not enough food to go round. (And it occurs to me that toddlers and babies may be drinking milk only, breastfeeding, in Ancient times.)
Why would one group be affected and not another? Different grains eaten. The rich in one area eat one type of stored grain. The poor slaves living in another area eat another grain and do not grow or gather or save enough to have stores.
What causes widespread poisoning? In the USA rural communities in previous centuries suffered from St Vitus dance. This was caused by a ind of mildew affecting stored grain when you had an unusually rainy season.
Farming communities learned to clear out the old, diseased grain in the spring before the new harvest.
In ancient times you could not persuade people to follow health and safety rules. They were lazy or thought if they could get away with ignoring the rule once they would try to get away with ignoring the rule as often as they could. The only way to make them obey a safety rule was to make the rule a ritual, a habit, a rule, a superstition. God said do it. You did it to celebrate a famous event.
So the ancient Hebrew communities celebrated not dying from the plague by have the Seder night. Seder means order. Passover - when the angel of death passed over. You get rid of all the flour in the house. (You can't eat moist bread. Only matzoh, dry flat crackers.)
The Last Supper of Jesus was according to some historians a Passover meal.
When Christians took over the custom, they gave it a new meaning. Lent. You may or may not like this version of the history of pancake day. If you have an alternative version, and/or more stories to add, I'd be glad to hear them.
ANY CHILD CAN MAKE PANCAKES - MY CHILD DID!
Belatedly I celebrated pancake day with pancakes for breakfast. the recipe for pancakes is easy. My son learned it from his maternal grandmother, my mother. He was a schoolboy. He asked a friend's mother for pancakes and she apologised because she had run out of pancake packet mix. He claims he astonished her by making up pancake mix and cooking her family pancakes.
As keen cooks will know, the main ingredients of pancakes (like the four ingredient quick sponge cake) are flour, milk, egg, with a little oil. (If you like, add a pinch of salt. Or oil. We are going easy on suspect salt and sugar.)
PANCAKE INGREDIENTS
I egg, 150 ml/gram milk, fifty mil/gram for flour.
A millilitre is a thousandth of a litre (litre ending re in England er in America), a centilitre is hundredth and a decilitre is a tenth. Wine bottles are 75 cl, three quarters of a liter - the word is abbreviated to make more room on the label.
For water or milk you can say mils or grams. Depending on density - mil is a volume, and a mil of water weighs a gram. But a mil of light, less dense oil weighs less than a gram. Oil may look thick, but oil spills float on the sea. If you have a balsamic vinegar mix, the ingredients separate and the oil floats on top of the vinegar. A mil of honey weighs more than a gram. Vinegar is the same density as water and goes to the bottom of your sauce jug.
PANCAKE TOPPING(S)
Lemon
Sugar
Cinnamon
Jam
Or other sweet/savoury topping
Traditionally lemon juice and white sugar. But the latest research suggests that for health and dieting sugar is bad whilst cinnamon is good. You might also like to use up old jam.
Utensils needed:
Bowl for flour.
Weighing scales (We use a flat scale.)
Stirring spoon
Sieve
Non-stick frying pan (the size of pancake)
Non stick spatula for turning pancake
Plate (dinner plate or at least the size of frying pan for serving pancake
(Smaller side plate will do if you serve the pancakes folded)
Knife and fork to eat pancake
Small spoon to serve jam from jar
METHOD
1 Sieve your flour into a bowl so flour does not make lumps.
2 Stir in egg. Mixture becomes thick like a solid dumpling.
3 Add milk slowly, stirring gradually to be sure you do not make lumps. I got fed up with this and used a blender.
4 Add small amount of oil to frying pan. Pour back excess and/or wipe off excess.
5 Turn heat under pan to low.
6 Pour in enough batter to cover surface.
7 When batter is turning solid, turn upside down with non-stick spatula in order to cook the other side.
8 When both sides are cooked, turn off heat.
9 Remove pancake with spatula to plate.
10 Add topping to pancake or serve to guests and allow them to choose their own toppings.
11 Host/cook. Ask guests to help clear and wash up. (Or say, 'Don't worry. I'll clear up.')
12 Guest. (If it's your turn to be the guest. Compliment cook and thank host/householder. Smile at children and nudge or tap their toes to encourage them to copy your thanks. Nod and grin when they do!)
Can you store extra/surplus pancake mix? It contains fresh egg.
Some people make a stack of pancakes and turn them into a cake, with chocolate or other sandwiching ingredient. Or serve with fruit after dinner.
Why make pancakes on Pancake Day? If you are religious, it is a religious Christian custom to give things up for Lent. You give up goodies for Lent by having them for the last time the day before, called Shrove Tuesday.
I watched a Discovery programme about the Ten Plagues and Pharaoh and the death of the first-born. Detectives were brought in to analyse why the firstborn died. Impossible for assassins to have entered every house, undetected, and never to have killed anybody else. That leaves disease and poison. Poison could be deliberate or accidental.
Why would a poison affect the firstborn more than others. Firstborn are older, often one year, two years, or four years older. They are given double portions, the only portion if there is not enough food to go round. (And it occurs to me that toddlers and babies may be drinking milk only, breastfeeding, in Ancient times.)
Why would one group be affected and not another? Different grains eaten. The rich in one area eat one type of stored grain. The poor slaves living in another area eat another grain and do not grow or gather or save enough to have stores.
What causes widespread poisoning? In the USA rural communities in previous centuries suffered from St Vitus dance. This was caused by a ind of mildew affecting stored grain when you had an unusually rainy season.
Farming communities learned to clear out the old, diseased grain in the spring before the new harvest.
In ancient times you could not persuade people to follow health and safety rules. They were lazy or thought if they could get away with ignoring the rule once they would try to get away with ignoring the rule as often as they could. The only way to make them obey a safety rule was to make the rule a ritual, a habit, a rule, a superstition. God said do it. You did it to celebrate a famous event.
So the ancient Hebrew communities celebrated not dying from the plague by have the Seder night. Seder means order. Passover - when the angel of death passed over. You get rid of all the flour in the house. (You can't eat moist bread. Only matzoh, dry flat crackers.)
The Last Supper of Jesus was according to some historians a Passover meal.
When Christians took over the custom, they gave it a new meaning. Lent. You may or may not like this version of the history of pancake day. If you have an alternative version, and/or more stories to add, I'd be glad to hear them.
ANY CHILD CAN MAKE PANCAKES - MY CHILD DID!
Belatedly I celebrated pancake day with pancakes for breakfast. the recipe for pancakes is easy. My son learned it from his maternal grandmother, my mother. He was a schoolboy. He asked a friend's mother for pancakes and she apologised because she had run out of pancake packet mix. He claims he astonished her by making up pancake mix and cooking her family pancakes.
As keen cooks will know, the main ingredients of pancakes (like the four ingredient quick sponge cake) are flour, milk, egg, with a little oil. (If you like, add a pinch of salt. Or oil. We are going easy on suspect salt and sugar.)
PANCAKE INGREDIENTS
I egg, 150 ml/gram milk, fifty mil/gram for flour.
A millilitre is a thousandth of a litre (litre ending re in England er in America), a centilitre is hundredth and a decilitre is a tenth. Wine bottles are 75 cl, three quarters of a liter - the word is abbreviated to make more room on the label.
For water or milk you can say mils or grams. Depending on density - mil is a volume, and a mil of water weighs a gram. But a mil of light, less dense oil weighs less than a gram. Oil may look thick, but oil spills float on the sea. If you have a balsamic vinegar mix, the ingredients separate and the oil floats on top of the vinegar. A mil of honey weighs more than a gram. Vinegar is the same density as water and goes to the bottom of your sauce jug.
PANCAKE TOPPING(S)
Lemon
Sugar
Cinnamon
Jam
Or other sweet/savoury topping
Traditionally lemon juice and white sugar. But the latest research suggests that for health and dieting sugar is bad whilst cinnamon is good. You might also like to use up old jam.
Utensils needed:
Bowl for flour.
Weighing scales (We use a flat scale.)
Stirring spoon
Sieve
Non-stick frying pan (the size of pancake)
Non stick spatula for turning pancake
Plate (dinner plate or at least the size of frying pan for serving pancake
(Smaller side plate will do if you serve the pancakes folded)
Knife and fork to eat pancake
Small spoon to serve jam from jar
METHOD
1 Sieve your flour into a bowl so flour does not make lumps.
2 Stir in egg. Mixture becomes thick like a solid dumpling.
3 Add milk slowly, stirring gradually to be sure you do not make lumps. I got fed up with this and used a blender.
4 Add small amount of oil to frying pan. Pour back excess and/or wipe off excess.
5 Turn heat under pan to low.
6 Pour in enough batter to cover surface.
7 When batter is turning solid, turn upside down with non-stick spatula in order to cook the other side.
8 When both sides are cooked, turn off heat.
9 Remove pancake with spatula to plate.
10 Add topping to pancake or serve to guests and allow them to choose their own toppings.
11 Host/cook. Ask guests to help clear and wash up. (Or say, 'Don't worry. I'll clear up.')
12 Guest. (If it's your turn to be the guest. Compliment cook and thank host/householder. Smile at children and nudge or tap their toes to encourage them to copy your thanks. Nod and grin when they do!)
Can you store extra/surplus pancake mix? It contains fresh egg.
Some people make a stack of pancakes and turn them into a cake, with chocolate or other sandwiching ingredient. Or serve with fruit after dinner.
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