Monday 2 March 2009

Pancake Competition '09 Round Up

Pork pancake 2

Having gloated long and hard about our winning pancake in the savoury category of this year's pancake competition, with our crispy aromatic pork belly pancakes, it's only fair that we show how doubly impressive this feat was, given the stupendous competition we were up against.

Anna and Edwin's smoked salmon with rocket and creme fraiche was delicious. I deliberately chose a nice, fat pancake that gave it the feeling of eating a Russian blini. With a dollop or two of caviar and a glass of ice cold vodka this would have been an outright winner.

Smoked salmon

Nick and Daryll served up a treat with their cranberry and brie pancake with rocket. The brie was so strong it needed a police escort. It reminded me of one of EAT's best baguettes but without the ham. Super stuff,

Brie cranberry and rocket

Heather and Blades also came over all veggie with their Mediterranean inspired pancake. Full of peppers, courgettes and feta it was deliciously Greek. You'll have to take my word for it that it tasted a lot better than this picture makes it look...

Roasted veg with feta

Having gorged ourselves like famished pilgrims in preparation for the big, pre-Easter fast, we readied ourselves for the sweet pancakes. Amazingly there wasn't a lemon and sugar entry in sight. And bravo to that.

Cowie was in charge of our sweet entry, which came in the format of a very elegant strawberry and passionfruit creation that lifted our battered palettes. Unfortunately for young Edwin, he bit a bit too hard into a passionfruit seed and snapped a tooth! Luckily, because this was a proper event, we had a full medical team in attendance, who made fun of him and were generally obnoxious, before realising that it was actually quite serious. Edwin, knowing what was at stake, put pain and discomfort to one side, collected a few man points, and carried on.

Edwin's joint entry with Anna was spectacular. Banoffee is an underused filling. In many ways, I think it is better when there isn't too much cream swimming around. Their banoffee sludge came studded with salted pecans which Anna apologised for profusely some reason. When it turned out that the saltiness of the pecans was a good thing, victory for Anna and Edwin in the sweet category was all but secured. Again, forgive the appearance and imagine tucking in!

Banoffee pancake

Heather and Blades produced a stirling effort with their apple sludge with creme fraiche. There was something very comforting about it. A homage to British food.

Sludge

Then came a great deal of controversy that is yet to be put to bed. Nick and Daryll had the audacity to enter a supermarket bought, pre-prepared, fruits of the forrest pancake into the contest. Whilst it looked and tasted good it has caused us to form a committee to write up a code of conduct document for next year!

Berry pancake

We had a wonderful evening feasting on pancakes. Thank you Blades and Heather for being such brilliant hosts. We're now looking forward to Edwin hosting it next year. If you have a look at last year's competition you can see that the standard has really stiffened. God only knows what heights we'll reach next year.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

This sounds like a lot of fun! I've never been a big fan of savoury pancakes but I really liked the sound of yours and the smoked salmon one.

Browners said...

Hi Ginger!

So pleased we are converting you to the joys of the savoury pancake! The smoked salmon one was really good too,

Hollow Legs said...

Your mates have brilliant names! Such a good idea to have a pancake competition. Unfortunately I'm pretty rubbish myself at them, I can't even toss them.

Anonymous said...

Ah! Very interesting to see the competition. The smoked salmon looks delish, although not as good as yours, obviously ;) I have always feared chipping a tooth on a passionfruit seed, and now I know it is actually possible I am even more fearful.

Browners said...

Hi Lizzie, I hadn't really thought about their names. But you are right. They are quite a funny collection!

I'm sure you'd be amazing pancake tosser.

Browners said...

Hi Helen,

Passionfruit are deadly. Delicious. But dangerous.

I can massively recommend the smoked salmon pancakes. Especially when you smoke the salmon yourself and pair it with vodka and caviar.

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