Lace pancakes

Lace Pancakes and more Bake Off controversies

Well hello there,

Here we are already at week four of Great British Bake Off and what a controversial week it has been!  The BBC have lost the programme, being outbid by Channel 4 to host the next series. It seems unclear whether this gentle British baking show, with occasional fun innuendoes, will survive a move to Channel Four, or will become some sort of extreme reality show with full-on smut as is suspected!

Mel and Sue have already said they will not follow the money to Channel 4, in a great display of loyalty and morals rarely seen in today’s opportunistic & capitalistic society.

mel-and-sue

All manner of new presenters have been suggested. One who might entice this viewer to keep watching is last year’s wonderful winner Nadiya. She is an absolute natural in front of the camera and what a coup it would be for her to land such a prestigious presenting job.

Bake Off

Hey ho – enough of the gossip and speculation – let’s get back to the baking and again I am entering into Mummy Mishaps Great Blogger Bake Off blogging challenge.

Mummy Mishaps

The technical challenge is Paul’s recipe again and his only advance tip to the bakers was the enigmatic advice to “practice your pattern before you use the mixture”.  Mel enlightened us all that the challenge is Lace Pancakes!   So, once again, the technical challenge controversially includes no actual baking! Is this a sign that the program is struggling for ideas?

I was delighted that, for the first time, I didn’t need to buy any ingredients for this technical challenge. Paul’s recipe is simply 175g plain flour, 1 large egg & 1 large egg yolk and 300ml butter. For some reason the tbsp caster sugar, which he said in the show is all important for browning the Lace Pancakes, isn’t included in the recipe but tacked on the end of the method. Bizarre and easy for some people to miss! Paul also faffs about with making wells in the flour, using separate jugs, beating then whisking. I simply put all the wet ingredients into my bender and then, with motor running, spooned in all the dry ingredients. Easy!

Lace pancakes

Mel gave a little more assistance saying that Lace Pancakes “should be intricate and beautiful, like a doily you might find in Carole Middleton’s guest bedroom”!

I had a look at some lace doilies on the Google and they are beautiful and intricate.

Bake Off
Random doily sourced from Google images

Although I love crafting, I am rubbish at freehand drawing, so this was going to be a difficult one for me. If I can’t draw with a pencil, how on earth was I going to draw with batter! Taking a cue from the contestants, I decided to draw some designs first. They all looked pretty rubbish!

Lace pancakes

Next I realised I didn’t have a fancy chef’s bottle to put the batter into for drawing the Lace Pancakes’ pattern. I had a look through my cupboards for a stand-in plastic squeeze bottle but found nothing suitable, as I try to buy as little plastic as possible in my effort to reduce my impact on the environment. I had to go buy one! All my local hardware store had was this set of plastic squeeze bottles for mustard, brown sauce and ketchup. The nozzle isn’t really fine enough for drawing Lace Pancakes but they had to do.

Lace pancakes

Once I started my first Lace Pancake, I discovered that what looks good on paper doesn’t transfer to looking good in batter and vice-versa!

Lace pancakes

This was supposed to be a heart within a heart – fail! I did discover that the bobbles around the outside are quite easy to do and look quite good in batter form. They also mean that you can hide any wobbly bits in the outer heart as splurges and gaps can be made into the bobbly edging!

I continued but simplified my Lace Pancakes design as I went. I would have lost marks from Paul & Mary for them not all being the same but at least they started to look a bit less messy. As I cannot stand for long periods of time, I had to take a couple of breaks while making my Lace Pancakes. So, this half hour recipe turned into more like an hour and a half for me!

Lace pancakes

The final design I ended up with for the last few isn’t really very pretty or intricate but at least I was getting some uniformity.

Lace pancakes

I was fairly pleased with my final Lace Pancake.

Lace pancakes

I really don’t get the point of Lace Pancakes. They are faffy and time-consuming and require greater artistic skill than I have. If I want a pancake, I want it to be able to hold a filling. If I want something very pretty, perhaps to serve to my girlfriends for afternoon tea, then we really want something more decadent than a pancake!

I can’t really envisage myself ever making Lace Pancakes again! I just don’t see the point! Do you?

Vohn
x

8 comments

    • Aw thanks Kat! Yes, I can always say “I have made lace pancakes” even though I know I never will again! 😉

  1. I totally agree… I really couldn’t see the point!

    • Lol Gina! I’m sure there must be a point but I haven’t found a single person who has discovered what that point is! 😉

  2. I had a “pancake off” with my freind the other week and we used ketchup bottles too. Pretty impressed with yours as I found making pancake animals hard – may need to give Paul’s recipe a go #GBBOBloggers2016

    • Oh your “pancake off” sounds like great fun Louise! I might suggest that for my local food group for pancake day next year! I can’t imagine how difficult it must be to make pancake animals! Go you! Kudos! 😀

  3. i have to say as pretty as they look, lacy pancakes are a little pointless because you don’t get much pancake do you? i would rather have a normal round one to be honest! I think your pancakes looked good though and I loved seeing your designs on paper.
    i am also worried about the GBBO moving to C4 🙁 xx
    thanks for linking up

    • Hear hear Jenny – pancakes for me are all about oozing with filling and these cannot be filled! Haha – glad you liked my designs – I’m a bit rubbish at drawing, so it always takes me an age to draw anything! Thanks for your great linky! 🙂

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