It's Pancake Day.

 It's Pancake Day. 

There is something charmingly traditional about Pancake Day that never fails to hold our attention. In the general scheme of things it probably means nothing to anybody in particular. But the fact is that a nation of children will be nagging their parents silly for an all-day session of baking, flipping, watching your pancake hit the ceiling and stay there for however long pancakes remain there once the temporary thrill and fun disappears until the same time next year. 

You were never quite sure what to make of Pancake Day since it always seemed a convenient excuse to use up the flour in your cupboard, make a horrendous mess in the kitchen and generally feel good about life. Pancake Day meant intensive preparation, loving care and a mouth-wateringly palatable sweet treat to seduce your senses, flirt with your taste buds and leave a sugary legacy in your mouth. 

Perhaps more than ever, Pancake Day is an absolute necessity when all around us is gloom, doom, desperation, devastation and utter depression. The coronavirus crisis, dare we say it now, does seem to turning a barely visible corner but a corner nonetheless. We do need something by way of a pleasant distraction, something to restore our faith in human nature when all around is the lingering threat that things will almost certainly go downhill again. 

For as long as you can remember now Pancake Day was that comforting break in the day when, just for a while, we can luxuriate in cholesterol heaven. Some like their pancakes with jam, some with sugar, others with that heavenly sugar rush that sends us all into some nostalgic wonderland when everything seemed set in stone, permanently fixed and destined to last forever perhaps. It was the time when the kids would be allowed to go stir crazy in the kitchen and a time when the back doors were always reliably open all day. 

The BBC's flagship children's programme Blue Peter would regularly give their very unique interpretation of Pancake Day. It did seem that every year without fail, John Noakes, Peter Purvis and Val Singleton would challenge Britain to make the most appealingly delicious pancake of all time. You wondered as a child whether you'd ever seen anything quite so banal or silly at any time in your life. Here were three very sensible and intelligent adults imploring you to get out your frying pan, manoeuvre said ingredients around the pan before reaching the conclusion of the operation with a flip-up into the air and then watching it landing face down on the pan. Mission accomplished. 

But then it suddenly occurred to you that there was indeed a method in their madness to quote the great Bard himself, William Shakespeare. Here was a celebration of the famous pancake, that magical tea time guilty pleasure laced with berries, cream, as much sugar as you desired and just a Digestive biscuit by way of accompaniment. It may only last a day but it did transport you back to a time when you came home from school, converged on your parents biscuit tin or bread caddy before gorging yourself on anything that had either chocolate or tons of sugar on it.  

Little did we know it at the time but in years to come, those years of sumptuous indulgence would come to haunt your teeth and gums. Pancakes though were never on your radar since your parents would insist you finish off the latest packet of biscuits or that irresistible slice of cake that had to be consumed come what may. 

And this is the moment when the very mention of pancakes takes you back to those mid-1960s tea times when chocolate Digestive biscuits, Rich Tea biscuits, Swiss rolls and Bourbon biscuits were prominently featured on your very personal menu. Then there were those moreish cream sponge cakes, the addictive Garibaldi biscuits dripping with raisins and those Nice biscuits that had those wonderful sugary bits and pieces on top that were too good to be true. 

However today is  Pancake Day, where up and down the land, tiny villages will be gathering together in their local church hall, setting up their bowls, mixing together their flour and water and whipping up pancakes in all shapes and sizes. There may well be bitter rivalries among certain neighbours or families from different roads, a fiercely competitive streak running through all of the contestants. This has suddenly turned into serious competition and there's pride at stake here. 

It is hard to remember what happened to either Val Singleton's or Lesley Judd's culinary creation on Blue Peter but you do recall certain studio cameramen cowering with fear in case one of the pancakes found its way onto their lens. Of course it's just a bit of harmless, gently inoffensive fun but the subject of pancakes does remind us that we still have much to pat ourselves on the back for something that is essentially frivolous. 

In a world that seems to have fallen apart at the seams, perhaps the subject of pancakes and their historical development should be made a compulsory exam subject at school. Besides, there has to be something life-affirming to laugh about, a moment to giggle at those delightful tea-time concoctions with lashings of everything that's supposed to be bad for your waistline. 

So let's turn on the cooker, crack a couple of eggs should you so wish, dig out your trusty wooden spoon and pretend that your childhood never really deserted you at all. Around Britain and wherever Pancake Day is recognised, pancakes will be flipped and flopped vigorously and then we'll probably be convulsed with laughter because hey who cared anyway. Anybody for a strawberry yogurt pancake smothered with hundreds and thousands, several packets of any biscuit of your choice and a wholesome cup of tea just to wash it all down. And don't forget the marzipan cakes and currant buns. We will indeed party again one day. Of course there can be no doubt.