Pancakes, Pancakes, Pancakes

April 24, 2020

As long as I can remember, my family has been a big believer in pancakes on weekend mornings. When we were young, my Dad would spoon pancakes into letters (typically the first letter of our names), stick figures, or animals. A family video shows my Dad allowing my oldest sister, Elyse, to eat a small spoonful of pancake batter: at three years old, she takes a ladleful in haste as my parents exclaim, “Elyse, just a small spoonful!”

As we got older, pancakes remained a part of our family routine, albeit appearing in more typical, circular shapes. Pancakes were a staple, staying with our family despite moves from Toronto to England, from England to Wales, and from Wales to Ottawa, where my three sisters and I spent our teenage years. We grew increasingly busy as we moved through middle school and high school, and academics, sports, and social circles drew us apart. However, on the weekend, my family would often congregate around a pancake breakfast, with the Five Roses Cookbook open on the counter, for those who did not have the recipe memorized.

When I moved to Victoria, British Columbia to attend university, I would go and see my only grandparent, my eighty-three year old Grandpa Pops, for dinner every few weeks. A notoriously picky eater, my grandad was undoubtedly unsure of what to cook for me, and on one of my first visits, we went to a small, local diner nearby. I ordered pancakes for dinner, and his problem was solved. For the foreseeable future, as soon as I arrived at his home, I would see the flour on the kitchen counter and knew we’d be having pancakes for dinner. My many memories of pancake-making with my grandfather added another layer to their significance. He passed away recently, on April 4, at ninety-one years of age. Reflecting on and writing this story could not have come at a better time.

I am now twenty-six and living with my partner in our first apartment together. His family did not cook pancakes every weekend, and to him, they do not qualify as a breakfast food. The first time I made pancakes for us, I recall him having just one – as a dessert, after his ‘real’ breakfast. Nevertheless, I persisted in making pancakes on odd weekends, pairing them with eggs and ‘real’ breakfast foods. And, over time, they have become part of our weekend routine. Now he wakes up asking for pancakes. I think I have successfully added another pancake-believer to my family.

In the midst of this pandemic, pancakes have brought stability and joy in a time of uncertainty and sadness. On weekend mornings, I have my Five Roses cookbook open on the counter (although I have memorized the recipe, I am a cautious chef), and it allows me to add some semblance of normalcy to my life. The pancakes taste the same as they did in England, in Victoria, and now back in Ottawa. Even confined to my apartment, I can continue traditions steeped in love and family.

From Five Roses Cookbook: A Guide to Good Cooking published in 2008 (eighth edition; first was in 1967)

Ingredients

1 ⅓ cups Five Roses All-Purpose Flour
3 tsps baking powder
½ tsp salt
2 tbsp sugar
1 egg
1 ¼ cups milk
3 tbsp melted butter of vegetable oil
¼ tsp vanilla

Stir Five Roses Flour, baking powder, salt and sugar together. Beat egg thoroughly; add milk. Make a well in centre of dry ingredients; slowly add the egg-milk mixture. Add melted butter and vanilla. Stir quickly until ingredients are just mixed and batter is still lumpy in appearance. Drop by ¼ cupfuls on hot pancake griddle. Cook the pancakes until they are filled with bubbles and the under surface is golden brown. Turn and brown the other side. Serve as hot as possible with syrup, honey, jam or jelly, bacon or sausages. Do not turn the pancakes more than once during cooking.

Yield: 10-12 pancakes

Rowen Germain lives in Ottawa, Ontario, and works as a historical researcher for Crown-Indigenous Relations and Northern Affairs.