Flippin' brilliant: it's Pancake Day

Yes indeed students, it is Pancake Day this coming Tuesday. Being hermetically sealed from the outside world as we are, Pancake Day always sneaks up on me. In my opinion it is a little silly to have a major religious festival (that’s Easter by the way, not Pancake Day) that slides about like some sort of unshelled mollusc.

Anyway, back to the matter at hand: Tuesday is the day and now you know about it you have no excuse not to eat them until you feel sick. You also have no excuse, never not ever, to use ready made pancake mix – it’s eggs, milk and flour, deal with it.

Right, rant over, we can move on to the important business of Pancake Day trivia. As most people know the purpose of Pancake Day, Shrove Tuesday really, is to use up all the rich ingredients in your larder (it’s back in the day, you’ve definitely got a larder) before the Lenten fast. The name comes from ‘Shriving’, when people would go to church to be shriven (absolved of their sins) before the start of Lent.

Now I knew this nugget before I started writing but what I’ve just learnt is that Mardi Gras is Pancake Day! Now I might be making myself sound really stupid but I’d just never put together my flipping a couple of pancakes with fun Brazilian beautiful people making merry in Rio. Mardi Gras is literally Fat Tuesday in French and clearly they know how to have fun better than we do. Although…

If good old English pancake making is just not edgy enough for you then why not take advantage of our proximity to Scarborough and head on down there for some Shrovetide Skipping. Massive skipping ropes are spread along the promenade and up to ten people skip at once. Apparently this kind of stuff used to take place all over the country but Scarborough is now the only place where you can get in on some communal skipping on the seafront.

Now we couldn’t really have a column without some world records and I quite enjoy that the world’s biggest pancake was 15 metres in diameter, weighed three tonnes and, unsurprisingly, contained about two million calories. It was created in Rochdale way back in 1994 but it’s unclear whether this record has proved impossible to break or whether it’s just that no one’s really that bothered.

Now as we all know, "it’s all fun and games until someone loses an eye", and so far we’ve covered all the fun that Pancake Day has to offer. Be warned however, there is a darker side. According to some old wives somewhere (and we all know how wise they are) if you partake of some sewing on Pancake Day then your house will be infested with snakes!! You have been warned.

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