Baking Galore

Bakery markets nurturing the requirement of large variety of buyers with new versions of waffles and pancakes. Amongst all the cake varieties, pancake and waffle are not widely acknowledged and still linger in the breakfast menu list.

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A crisp, honeycomb texture of waffles and the golden delicacy of pancakes are perfect base for a host of delectable tastes. Pancakes come in many guises around the world. They can be sweet or savory, thick or thin, made with wheat, rice or buckwheat flours. Besides being versatile, it has captured the consciousness of many since ages. Pancakes have reflected scores of cultural changes, precipitated new ones, and promoted the entire bakery industry.

Traces of Pancakes

While panning the traces of pancakes, one comes across two different methods of their preparation, descended from European and American subcontinent.

In United Kingdom, pancakes are made from thin batter cake fried in a frying pan. On the other hand, in United States, pancakes are raised batter cake fried on a griddle or flat-bottomed pan.

To be more comprehensive, pancakes are any batter cake fried in oil or butter and can be eaten both hot and cold. Their origins extend to antiquity and they have been featured in cookbooks way back from the mid of fifteenth century.

For constituting the base, all pancakes requires a mixture three key ingredients: plain flour, eggs, and milk. The batter is quite runny and forms a thin layer on the bottom of the frying pan when the pan is tilted. During the process, it can form some bubbles during cooking, which result in a pale pancake with dark spots where the bubbles were, but the pancake does not rise much.

These pancakes can be eaten sweet with numerous traditional sweet toppings, most often with lemon cream or wrapped around savory stuffings and eaten as a main course. When pancakes are baked instead of frying, this batter rises (depite having no raising agents it rises because the air beaten into the batter expands) and is known as 'Yorkshire pudding'.

British pancakes are similar to crepes, but they are not "lacy" in appearance.