The pancake edition

7 pancake options for Shrove Tuesday/Pancake Day/Fat Tuesday. Or, to be honest, any day ending with a ‘y’.

Growing up, Pancake Day was one of the food highlights of my year (second only to Easter). The sheer thrill of getting to eat pancakes after school. Of lingering in the kitchen, waiting for Mum to serve up the next pancake. Of smothering it with lemon and sugar and rolling it into a flat cigar.

Sidenote: I should probably explain for non-British readers that the pancake of choice for families in 1980s England was crepe-style, thin pancakes, sometimes from a packet mix, served with granulated sugar and a squeezy bottle of lemon juice. Does that all sound baffling? Yes. Was it delicious? Yes.

Pancakes may be ubiquitous now – as opposed to the once-a-year event of my childhood – but there’s still something special about Pancake Day. Probably because it’s the only Tuesday of the year I eat pancakes.

Not to brag, but I’m kind of a pancake expert. (In that I eat a lot of pancakes. That makes me an expert, right?)

Below are seven pancake recipes that I make on the regular, covering all the main bases: thick ‘n’ fluffy, thin and crepey, sweet, savoury, sourdough…

All of these recipes are vegan or easily veganised. So, there’s no eggs involved, and the milk is usually plant milk. (If you eat dairy, by all means use dairy milk.) For those recipes that do specify dairy milk, rest assured I’ve used soy or full-fat oat milk and had no issues.

The only thing missing is a good gluten-free option. I’ve tried a few oat flour pancakes over the years and always been disappointed, but if anyone has a great GF recommendation, feel free to drop it in the comments for other readers.

Shall we begin?

For the sweet pancake lovers:

An egg-free version of those thin pancakes of my childhood came from an unlikely source: Georgina Hayden’s tahini, cinnamon and carob pancakes from the book Nistisima (recipe is online here). The tahini and carob sauce is optional if you’re a die-hard lemon-and-sugar lover. In the pic below, I made a sauce with tahini, cocoa and maple syrup, but I’ve also had them with lemon and sugar. You can take the girl out of England and all that.

Georgina Hayden’s pancakes

Prefer fluffy pancakes? For just some basic, run-of-the-mill, fluffy vegan pancakes, with no special ingredients required, you can’t go wrong with this Tasty recipe. (First decent vegan pancakes I ever made were these.)

But if you have polenta (cornmeal) in the cupboard, I highly recommend going a step further and making

Richard Makin

’s (aka School Night Vegan) cornmeal buttermilk pancakes. I love the subtle texture from the cornmeal. In case you’re wondering where the hell you find vegan buttermilk, the ‘buttermilk’ is made by mixing plant milk with lemon juice.

Cornmeal buttermilk pancakes

For super-thick and fluffy pancakes – the kind that make a comically tall tower of pancakes – I refer you to my sourdough banana pancakes. Recipe follows at the end.

Another option is Olia Hercules’ buckwheat drop scones from the book Summer Kitchens (recipe is online here – note that you can use sourdough or yeast). Imagine a crumpet and a pancake had an Eastern European lovechild – that’s these pancakes. They’re OTT bubbly, and have fantastic flavour from the buckwheat and sourdough. Trypophobics might want to look away for a second…

Buckwheat drop scones. Look at those holes! Or don’t, if you have trypophobia

And two savoury options:

I’m a big fan of Ottolenghi’s courgette, chickpea and herb pancakes. I know it’s not courgette season (not that anyone’s told the supermarkets that), but you can use other grated veg instead. I’ve made them with grated carrot and a few forkfuls of sauerkraut and they were ace. Grated winter squash would also work.

Ottolenghi’s courgette, chickpea and herb pancakes

For all you sourdough bakers, I often make a giant kimchi pancake with my sourdough starter. It makes a robust, hearty pancake – not unlike a potato farl in texture.

Giant sourdough kimchi pancake

To feed two people,* you’ll need 350g active, bubbly sourdough starter. (If I’m making this for breakfast, I’ll feed my starter the night before. Otherwise, I’ll feed it as soon as I get up.) To the starter, add:

• ½ tsp salt and a good grinding of black pepper

• 50g chickpea flour

• 1 tsp each ground turmeric, garlic powder, onion powder and chilli flakes

• A few forkfuls of kimchi

• 1 grated carrot

• A handful of chard or spinach, shredded

• 1 inch fresh ginger, finely grated

To cook, heat 2 tablespoons oil in a non-stick pan and fry the pancake for 5 minutes on each side. Transfer the pancake to a board for a few minutes, before cutting into wedges and serving with loads of mayo and hot sauce.

*I’ve legit eaten this entire pancake on my own. More than once.

What to eat this week: Banana sourdough pancakes

Alright, here’s those super-thick and fluffy sourdough banana pancakes I promised you. If I had to choose a favourite sweet pancake recipe, it’d be this one. I’ve always got the ingredients on hand, and I love that the pancakes are naturally sweetened by the mashed banana and vanilla. (So no added sugar here. Although I obviously recommend lashings of maple syrup on top.)

Plus, I’m convinced the sourdough makes them more satisfying than regular pancakes, like how sourdough bread seems to fill me up (in a good way) more than non-sourdough bread.

If you can’t tell, I’ve made these over and over and over again

Makes roughly 12 chonky pancakes (recipe is easily halved)

Wet ingredients:

• 250g active, bubbly sourdough starter (if making for breakfast, feed your starter the night before)

• 1 large ripe banana, mashed

• 200g plant milk (yes, I weigh my liquids in grams if I’m already using scales)

• 1 tbsp apple cider vinegar

• 1 tsp vanilla extract

Dry ingredients:

• 200g plain flour

• 1 tsp baking powder

• 1 tsp bicarbonate of soda

• ½ tsp salt

For frying and serving:

• I use sunflower oil, but you do you

• maple syrup, fruit, plant yoghurt, toasted seeds and nuts

Combine the wet ingredients in a bowl and mix thoroughly. Add in the dry ingredients and whisk until just combined.

Heat 1 tsp oil in a non-stick pan on medium heat. You should be able to fit three pancakes in the pan at a time – working on the basis that each pancake is ¼ cup of batter or a (not quite full) ladle.

Cook until the pancakes have bubbles popping on the surface, then flip and cook for another minute or two. Remove and serve. (Or, if you want to serve all the pancakes at once, they’ll happily sit in a very low oven while you cook the rest of the batch.)

Repeat with the remaining batter, adding more oil to the pan as needed.

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