Great British Pancakes

Eggs are the essential ingredient for perfect pancakes this Shrove Tuesday. Combine them with the best of British ingredients to give your pancakes a tasty - and patriotic - twist.

Traditionally, Shrove Tuesday was the day in which eggs were used up before the period of Lent and Pancake Day remains ever-popular - in fact it is the single biggest week for egg sales.

A DOZEN FACTS FOR PANCAKE DAY

• Pancakes are traditionally eaten on Shrove Tuesday, the day when households customarily eat meat, eggs and dairy products before the period of Lent. This year Pancake Day falls on Tuesday 5 February, the earliest it has been for 200 years.

• The pancake has a very long history and featured in cookbooks as far back as 1439. 

• The world’s biggest pancake was cooked in Rochdale in 1994 – it was 15 metres in diameter and weighed 3 tonnes. 

• On 28 June 1997, Ralf Laue from Leipzig broke the world record by tossing a pancake 416 times in two minutes.  

• Mike Cuzzacrea ran a marathon while continually tossing a pancake for three hours, two minutes and 27 seconds on 24 October 1999.  

· An old French tradition involves touching the handle of the frying pan and making a wish when the pancake is turned whilst holding a coin.

· On Pancake Day children used to go shroving – a visiting custom where children sang or recited poetry in exchange for food or money. A popular shroving rhyme went like this:

'Knock, knock, the pan's hot

And we are coming a-shrovin

For a piece of pancake

Or a piece of bacon

Or a piece of truckle cheese

· In the village of Olney, Buckinghamshire, Shrove Tuesday has been celebrated with a pancake race since 1445. Local women run from the market place to the church tossing pancakes as they run. The women dress in traditional housewife costumes as it is said that the tradition began when one harassed wife heard the shriving bell and dashed off to church still clutching her frying pan.

· British regions used to have their own pancake specialities: Wales has a very strong tradition of pancakes - also known as Welshcakes, which are made with sour cream, buttermilk or cream and the surface has tiny holes. When cooked, they're spread with butter and piled on top of one another, so that the butter oozes down through the holes. Sometimes fish, cheese, sugar, jam or lemon juice is added between the layers; once made, the pile is cut into quarters before serving.

· In Swansea, pancakes are rolled into cigar shapes, but in most regions they’re left flat.

· In Gloucester pancakes were made with suet, which gave them a rich, grainy texture. They were the size of a large scone, fried in lard, and served with golden syrup.

· In Britain different pancakes were made for the poor and for the rich. The former was quick-cooking, portable food that was eaten by farm labourers. The batter was made with mild ale, powdered ginger and sometimes chopped apple. Small ladlefuls of the batter were cooked in lard. These pancakes were known as Harvest pancakes. Meanwhile the rich pancakes were large and thin. They were made with cream, nutmeg, dark sherry, rosewater or orange flower water, and cooked in butter.

AND HALF A DOZEN FACTS ABOUT EGGS

• We eat around 10 billion eggs a year – about 28 million a day.

• Over a lifetime, an average person will eat 7,300 eggs. 

• A typical medium egg has only 80 calories. 

• Around 85% of UK shell eggs are produced to standards of the Lion Quality Code of Practice.

· The largest egg ever had five yolks and was 31cm around the long axis.

· Which came first – the chicken or the egg?

It was the chicken – source: The Bible

“And the evening and the morning were the fourth day.  And God said, “Let the waters bring forth abundantly the moving creatures that had life and fowl that may fly about the earth and the open firmament of heaven” Genesis 1:20 

For perfect pancakes make sure you use eggs bearing the Lion mark, which guarantees that they have been produced to the highest standards of food safety.  All Lion Quality eggs come from British hens vaccinated against salmonella, are fully traceable and have a ‘best before’ date on the shell as a guarantee of freshness.