So this IS Christmas
Christmas morning here in Whanganui is quiet, unhurried and just plain lovely. The most important job for me after getting Christmas texts away to the children (because it was way too early for them to be awake) is flipp’in pancakes. I’m pretty good at it actually. Homemade pancake batter made by my big sister earlier (and to which I add a generous slosh of milk to give it a happy pouring consistency). Generous because it’s Christmas day afterall! AND it’s for whanau, my family.
The recipe’s a family secret, no secret at all actually, it’s made with love, pan-sized! But just for you readers I’m sending you over to one of my favourite websites called ‘Blokes Who Bake’ it’s a Steve Joll fabulous little online recipe book and because pancakes are such a convivial way to wake up a day.
I’m going to suggest a buttermilk pancake recipe. And just so there’s no harumphing because not everyone has tapioca flour, just use what you have in the cupboard. Same with the bicarb, I use Edmonds baking powder because it’s always just to hand.
Pancakes by any other Name
Americans have their flapjacks and Hungarians their palascintas. Seems that a culture isn’t a culture without its very own pancake. A pancake by any other name is called Bao Bing, Po-Ping or Bin-Ja Tuk, Blini, Blintz, Creier De Ritel Pane, Crepe, Dadar Gutung, Eierkckas, Flensjes, Flaeskpannkaka, Injera, Latke, Palascinta, Pannekoeke, Ployes, Poh Pia, Qata-Ef, Tortilla or simply Pikelets here in New Zealand
“What’s so special about pancakes that they defy history and national borders? What propels them into the upper echelons of elemental foods along with puddings, soups and stews, the dishes that make humanity salivate? They’ve inspired folktales, sayings, festivals, silly races and ritualised food fights. How can that be?
They’re humble, for starters. Pancakes were one of the original fast foods. Pancake batter was simple, using easy-to-find ingredients—milk, flour, butter or oil, eggs, even just flour and water in some recipes. The batter can be used immediately or kept overnight in the fridge. You didn’t need a fancy oven top, just a pan and a fire as any camper knows.
Early American settlers fried them on their hoe blades over camp fires, inventing hoecakes. In Southeast Asia coconut milk is a stand in for whole milk and frying the pancakes in a wok. They serve them with palm sugar and lime. Seems to me that ‘life is about flexibility, not about formulas’ and that’s exactly where the pancake works so well.
Early Versions
Pancakes lend themselves to countless versions and so many cultural signatures. They can be wrappers or the main event, breakfast or dinner, street food or a luxury dessert. The Dutch pop theirs in the oven for a pancake-souffle hybrid. Indonesians wrap them around sugared coconut meat. Brits munch yeasted, holey cakes with preserves.
Pancakes are in fact such changelings they can be hard to define. Nearly every time you come up with a rule, a cake defies it. The true magic of pancakes lies in how such inexpensive simplicity produces such reliable deliciousness. Few things in life deliver so much from so little. That explains why they have survived various revolutions, from France’s haute cuisine to America’s low-carb fad. Certainly, the pancake has history on its side.
It is a direct descendant of the very early Neolithic flatbreads baked on hot stones. When the pancake split from early flatbreads remains a mystery, but the break was made by the time Romans roamed across Europe and Africa. Apicius, the ancient Roman cookbook includes a recipe served with pepper and honey. Pancakes survived the collapse of the Roman empire. By the Middle Ages, they were known as frayse and portable griddles, key to pancake making were common.
A 1430 English culinary manuscript mentions pancakes, and the oldest Dutch cookbook (1514) includes several recipes. ‘The Family Dictionary or ‘Household Companion’ printed in London in 1710 instructs cooks wanting ‘cripf pancakes’ to make 12 or 20 of them in a little frying-pan, no bigger than a Saucer, then boil them in lard, and they will look yellow as Gold, and eat very well.
In America, the first ready mix was introduced at the New Era Exposition in St. Joseph Missouri in 1889. Then came pancake houses. As pancakes have figured largely on the table so too have they in culture and tradition. In the past, Russians ate a meal of pancakes after praying for the dead. In France, dropping a pancake was considered bad luck—Napoleon supposedly blamed it for a disastrous Russian campaign. Norway, Germany and the United States have folktales of runaway pancakes, all of which get eaten in the end.
Traditions
In many European countries, Shrove Tuesday, or Mardi Gras, was previously known as Pancake Day. Stacks of pancakes were consumed to use up the butter and eggs forbidden during Lent. In England, the tradition lives on with celebrations such as the Great Pancake Grease, during which a school cook at Westminster Abbey tosses a huge pancake to a pack of schoolboys. The boy who emerges from the melee with the largest piece gets a prize.
In Olney, England, the religious holiday is known as Pancake Day Race. In most years since 1445, local, aproned housewives toting cast iron pans sprint 375 meters while flipping a cake three times. The first to arrive at the church, serve her pancake to the bell ringer and be kissed by him, wins.”
Pancakes are also fodder for many children’s books, such as “Curious George Makes Pancakes.” The breakfast staple also inspired one of America’s most familiar clichés, “flat as a pancake.” That phrase having been amply applied to Kansas, a team of scientists put it to the test in 2003. Their findings: Kansas is in fact flatter than a pancake.
Christmas day for me has become quite understated as the years have gone by. I don’t mind that. I just love being with family. We’re having Christmas dinner in the evening this year, so we’ve opted for a grazing brunch-type affair across the day. Until then, these lucky little bunnies are going to be eating one of life’s humble and reliably delicious treats. Ngā mihi o te Kirihimete, Merry Christmas my friends.
