“Pancakes”
So – it’s interesting how difference pancake and the pluralized pancakes are. Singular is a one lonesome thing, mostly a texture, and probably old. Rubbery and crenellated, it’s more of a crepe or something rather than the delicious breakfast non-bread that we think of as PANCAKES.
Plural it’s a meal. There’s the warmth as you enter their arena – whether it be the kitchen or the diner, there’s syrup that pushes the smell into you, promising so much – but the warmth is what I think of first. Like a fireplace in winter, pancakes are something to be pulled up and cuddled with.
Pancakes are for breakfast, or for sleepovers.
There’s a moment that makes you think they might be slightly brittle, because the best ones are almost crisp on the outside, and spongey enough to be almost molten on the inside – absorbing the syrup and drawing the thick liquid through them compartmentally – osmosis rather than capillary action. But the fork slides through them effortlessly, layers of butter and sugar and pancake all being pressed together into one solid mass.
The taste – when it’s perfect – is almost too hot. You can suck the sweetness out and any blueberries or chocolate chips hidden within are tart (or sweet) sudden reminders of what you’re doing. They are more the signature of the maker than of the product, not so much part of the pancake as an interruption thereof.
The syrup gets everywhere. Somehow, even though fastidious consumption is the order of the day, soon fingers are sticky and the beard is sticky and the napkin has become overused and is also sticky, refusing to leave the hand again. It’s on the table, and your elbow is sticking to it, and a carelessly dangled hand is SO sticky that a random house pet will decide to help and so I often associate pancakes with cold noses and hot breath, wet tongues and hidden movement. Probably my LEAST favourite part of it all.
The sizzle of the batter as it hits the grill is nowhere near as important in my mind as the scraping of the spatula, pulling them away, flipping them and placing them back with a slap, lost in the sounds of the heating of their neighbours. Often the sound of the pancake is overridden by conversation, because pancakes are not to be eaten alone. They are a social circle – a coin of conversational currency. Golden brown and waiting – ”
