Pancake Day in Birmingham and the rest of the UK varies annually as it always falls on the final day before the commencement of Lent, the day before Ash Wednesday and 47 days before Easter Sunday.
Each year the majority of people will ask the same question, when is Pancake Day? Listed below are the actual dates of Shrove Tuesday, Pancake Day's official name.
2012 - 21 February
2013 - 12 February
2014 - 4 March
2015 - 17 February
2016 - 9 February
2017 - 28 February
Countries like Russia also celebrate a similar pan cake day which is pronounced by a Russian as 'Maslenitsa'.
Others like the German, French, Spanish, Turkish, Chinese, Dutch, Japanese and Korean populations also eat types of pancakes or crepes, although some of these countries do not have an offical celebrations day.
Children might want to know the meaning of the day and as identified above it is always the final day prior to Lent, Lent being a period of abstinence, in other words a period of self-denial. So it is officially the last day for one to overindulge and use up all the food particles which are not allowed during the period of Lent. Lent runs for 40 days, not counting Sundays, and ends on the Saturday of the Easter weekend period.
The eating of pancakes on this day originally came from the Christian religion and their observation of Lent, however, in providing this information it is suggested that very few people, today, participate in the 40 day period of abstinence as previously mentioned.
Pancakes are produced from the following ingrediants, 8 ounces of plain flower, ¼ teaspoon of salt, 2 eggs and 1 pint of milk, which is mixed together to form batter. This batter mix will provide six helpings of the traditionally thin pancake.
Recipe - Sift the flour and salt into a basin, make a well in the centre and break the eggs into it. Add 5 fluid ounces of milk and stir gradually, working the flour down from the sides and adding more milk as required to make a stiff batter consistency. Beat well for approximately 5 minutes and then add the rest of the milk. Cover and place in a refrigerator for at least 30 minutes. To produce the pancake add a small amount of oil to one of your frying pans, turn on the heat and when you see smoke rising from the oil add an amount of batter to thinly cover, fully, the base of the pan. When the edges start to curl it is an indication that the pancake requires turning, either by tossing or for the inexperienced pancake producers by simply turning over using a spatula. The finished pancake can then be plated, sprinkled with sugar or castor sugar and a dash of lemon. The pancake is then rolled and quickly devoured, especially if you want another, and another, and another.
The same batter mix can also be used for the production of Yorkshire pudding but this is seen by many "Brummies" and residents of the Black Country, as a waste of a good pancake.
As a fund raiser, Birmingham and local charities, like many towns and cities in the UK organise pancake races at various venues with the objective being to run a short race tossing and catching the pancake in a frying pan for a pre-agreed number of times, if one fails to catch the flipped pancake they either start again or face disqualification. The important thing to remember is that for those who finish the race, the pancake must be totally intact.
Olney, in Buckinghamshire, 12 miles from Milton Keynes, is famous for its Pancake Day race; this is the town where it allegedly all started. In 1445 one of the women of Olney heard the local church bell whilst making pancakes and thinking something was amiss, ran to the church still clad in her apron and holding her frying pan and pancake.
The pancake race at Olney is now world renown with its competitors, all local women dressed in apron, hat and scarf, with each one carrying a hot frying pan and pancake and having to toss the pancake on three occasions during a 375 metre race along a winding course. The fastest time was set in 1967 of 1 minute and three seconds.
As a point of Activ interest, the highest flip of a pancake was 9.17 metres, recorded at the Palace Theatre, New York in 2010. The largest pancake made and cooked was in Rochdale in 1994 and was 15.0 metres long and individually the most pancakes eaten in 1 hour was 855, recorded in 2006.
Enjoy your pancakes at any time, as they are so delicious, but do watch out for any sudden weight gain.
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