It was such a lovely day today I could not resist firing up my beloved Blackstone to have a go at making British style pancakes in a practice run for Shrove Tuesday/Pancake day. I told myself it was to make content but let's face it, I mostly wanted a reason to eat pancakes two days in a row.
On Saturday I'd been along to Blackstone's inaugural pancake stacking contest at Rodeos, just outside Olney where pancake races originated hundreds of years ago after a woman raced to the church carrying the pancake still in the pan when she heard the shriving bell. My son actually won the stacking contest with his pile of 20 American pancakes!
I love American pancakes but at this time of year you have to have British style I think.
They are so easy to make - just plain flour, eggs, milk and a pinch of salt plus some oil to cook them with.
You don't need any special equipment - a fork and bowl and a frying pan will do. However I opted to mix a big batch in my stand mixer and decided with the sunshine out for once I would head outside and cook them on the Blackstone.
My first attempt at traditional round pancakes was not too successful because without the structure of the pan they went a bit wild.
Then I hit upon the genius idea of making one massive pancake on the 36 inch griddle which I could cut into smaller portions to serve everyone at once!
Seasoned correctly food doesn't generally stick on the Blackstone and with the four burners the heat is distributed really evenly so it was a doddle to make my super-sized pancake. It cooked really quickly and evenly on the first side then I cut it into portions. I even attempted a flip - check out my face!!!
Then onto the fun bit - serving with everyone's favourite toppings. We had the very traditional sugar and lemon, chocolate spread, honey, maple syrup, strawberries and blueberries on offer.
Despite it being March it was lovely in the sun so we sat outside and enjoyed our pancakes until a tractor whizzed past in the field behind our house and showered us in what I assume was fertiliser pellets That's country living for you!
