Series 7, Episode 4, Heart-Shaped Lace Pancakes
It’s nearly Pancake Day! Personally, I have pancakes any day of the year, does that make me a rebel? Here’s Paul Hollywood’s pancake recipe: https://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/lace_pancakes_20045
The recipe has slightly different quantities to the recipe I usually use (I also usually make them round). I considered using my own recipe but didn’t want to rebel and thought maybe this one was better for lacy pancakes.
I made the batter using the same method I usually do, which is to add the egg to the flour and whisk the milk in a little bit at a time. I had a couple of small lumps so I sieved it, I usually wouldn’t bother but I was worried the lumps would get trapped in the nozzle. Here’s my batter in the squeezy bottle:
My practice pancake was awful, I won’t even show a photo of it here. The dots on the outside were a bit awkward, but after a bit of practice I started to get the hang of making them pretty. Here’s one before flipping:
And here’s a different one after flipping:
Hopefully you can see that it’s just starting to brown and cook nicely.
Once they were cooked I managed to get them onto places, but it was difficult to do without them breaking. Also, they were awkward to eat and awkward to put any toppings on. I ended up just scrunching it up like spaghetti and eating them that way.
They were a pretty easy challenge for a technical challenge, but normal round pancakes are much less faff and easier to cover in lemon, sugar, golden syrup, chocolate spread, fruit, bacon, maple syrup etc…
My recipe uses 2 eggs, 120g of flour and 300 ml of milk. Add the eggs to the flour and mix a bit, add a tiny bit of milk to loosen it up and slowly add the milk, getting rid of as many lumps as you can as you go. I don’t bother resting my batter because I’m impatient and I don’t know what the benefit of resting is. Heat a tiny about of oil in a pan and turn down to medium-low. Spoon some batter in the pan and rock the pan around to coat the bottom. Use a non-metal spatula to loosen the sides of the pancake with the spatula and once it’s ready to flip it will move freely around the pan (if it’s a decent non-stick pan). Once it’s at that stage, flip with either the spatula or have a go and flipping in the pan, and cook the other side for a minute or so. This recipe works every time, without a bad first one, unless the non-stick on your frying pan doesn’t work, then it’ll be a disaster.
Enjoy pancake day! I know I’ll definitely be making round pancakes.
Lily
February 12, 2024
Peter
It’s like a shallow-fried funnel cake!