No matter what reincarnation of the festival you observe: Pancake Day. Mardi Gras (Fat Tuesday!), or Shrove Tuesday, the idea is to enjoy one final binge on rich foods before the ritual fasting of the Lenten season.

In Anglo-Saxon England, Christians went to confession and were “shriven” of their sins before the start of Lent hence the practice of celebrating and merrymaking before going to confession at the beginning of Lent.

 

Foods that were forbidden during Lent such as butter, sugar and eggs were combined with milk and a runny batter became the vehicle to carry sugary, self-indulgent foods.  Now, let’s be clear about this, you don’t have to be a devout Christian to observe Shrove Tuesday.

As a child I would always enjoy my pancakes sprinkled in sugar and squeezed with lemon juice, now however, children seem to take the blow-out to extremes; spreading jam, ice-cream with sauce and chocolate spread over theirs – sometimes all of the above!

 

The traditional crêpe has also been adulterated into fluffy American-style pancakes that need to be stacked, topped with bacon, drizzled in maple syrup and cut like a cake rather than simply used to wrap a combination of fillings.

How to make the perfect crêpe 

A few years ago, I made a delicious savoury pancake to mark the occasion: Courgette Pancake filled with cheese!  Check it out by clicking on the link!

Avocado and Banana Pancakes

This year, in a bid to make something slightly different again, I researched the internet to see if pancakes could be made with the increasingly popular avocado. Now, before you condemn me, chocolate cakes can be made with avocados – at least that’s where my justification came from.

Ingredients:

160g Plain Flour
2 Tbsp brown sugar
2 Tspn baking powder
1/4 Tspn salt
1 Avocado; halved, peeled, pitted and sliced
1 Banana; peeled and sliced
1 Tspn Vanilla Extract
240mls Milk

Follow the recipe on the youtube clip above to create delicious avocado based pancakes.

So whether you’re a purist, a glutton, a sweet-toothed child, or desperately trying to be health-conscious; it would be a sin not to try and make pancakes in some form or other to celebrate the day!

Flippin’ gorgeous!