Pancakes

In England, pancake day is always on a Tuesday.  In France, it's always on the 2nd Feb.  We had pancakes yesterday, or at least, the nearest French equivalent, that is, crêpes.

As a kid, I only ever got given pancakes to eat on pancake day, and they were always covered in melted butter, sugar and lemon juice.  In France they will eat crêpes given any opprotunity; they are served as snacks on any occasion, and are covered in any kind of (sweet) topping that might appeal.  French kids and many adults go for Nutella, but jams are popular too, as is a simple sprikling of sugar.  Lemon juice is not unknown.

We were invited to a friend's house in the village, where we were served crêpes, accompanied with several options for spreads, including, to my surprise, some strong liquors such as scotch, cassis and other flavoured alcohols.   Guided, as I thought by the suggestions of our hosts, I discovered that scotch with marmelade made an excellent topping, as did cassis with certain jams.  It was only later that they told us, over a glass of wine, they had rather expected that we would choose either the alcohol, or the jams, but not both.  Oh well, live and learn.