Pancake Week Albuquerque

Get out your griddles and your spatulas and get ready for National Pancake

Week! To understand our excitement for Pancake Week Albuquerque, you’ll have to

first get a little bit of history.

Starting in the Middle Ages, meat, eggs, and dairy items were forbidden during Lent. Many sources site the practice of preparing for this period of abstinence by using up items in the pantry, such as eggs, milk, and butter, by making big batches of pancakes. In fact, in some countries Mardi Gras is also called Pancake Day, because of this tradition. To this day, many communities around the world feast on pancakes all the way through Shrove Tuesday--also known as Fat Tuesday or Mardi Gras-- before the season of moderation begins on Ash Wednesday. Actually, another name for Fat Tuesday is Pancake Day.

Let’s take a look at a couple of the biggest Pancake Week Celebrations:

•The small town of Olney, England has been holding its Pancake Race every year since 1445. According to the lore, it began when an Olney housewife was cooking the family's traditional Shrove Tuesday pancakes. The church bell began to ring, summoning the townspeople to service, and the woman was so anxious to get there on time that she ran outside still holding her skillet--pancakes and all. This moment is reenacted in the town's annual Pancake Race: contestants line up, skillets in hand, waiting for the "pancake bell" to ring. Then they toss pancakes in the air, catch them in their skillets and race 400 yards to the church. When they reach the finish line, they must toss their pancakes one more time. After the race, everyone attends church services and then enjoys a community pancake party.

• Determined not to leave all the fun to the Brits, the town of Liberal, Kansas has been competing with Olney in a good-natured transatlantic Pancake Race rivalry since 1950. 

• In Russia, the pre-Lenten pancake feast is known as Maslenitsa, and is celebrated by eating thin buckwheat crepes called blini, accompanied by caviar, honey, jam, sour cream or butter. These little symbols of the sun--golden, round and warm--signify the end of winter and the coming of spring. Bonfires, fireworks and snow games round out the festivities.

• And last but not least, in the great state of New Mexico, we’re going all out for pancakes. Albuquerque is hosting the biggest community bake-off in history! Ok, ok, you caught me. Although the don’t have the biggest coordinated effort in Pancake Week Albuquerque history, we feel pretty confident there will be more homes than not enjoying the light fluffiness that we’ve come to know and love, called pancakes. 

We’re actually willing to bet that after reading this article, your stomach is growling and you’re about to Google creative pancake variations right now! We sure are!

Stack 'Em Up in honor of Pancake Week Albuquerque! 

Whatever you may call them--battercakes, blini, blintzes, crepes, flapjacks, griddlecakes, hotcakes, johnnycakes, or pancakes--they stack up to a plateful of good eating. Experiment with thick batters and thin, make them sweet or savory, and try out all sorts of toppings and stuffings. Have a great time indulging in pancakes this week!