Pancake Kit [AD]

We were gifted a Pancake Baking Set by Britain loves Baking for us to try in time for Pancake Day. We LOVE pancakes in our house so Pancake Day is always a big deal for us. 

We were super excited to try these kits and the instructions appeared simple and straightforward. All we needed to provide were the eggs and everything else should have been in the kit. 

I was slightly confused when the kit arrived and it was covered already in some form of powder which I assume is Pancake Mix but nothing in the box was leaking so that was a bit baffling. 

Once we opened the box we realised we were missing one of the UHT and one of the Whipping Cream. The Tropical compote was unusable as it had mould in it so we weren’t off to a good start but we continued on and started to make the mixes. 

We started with the Chocolate Pancake Mix as it seemed the simplest one for the toppings etc.

I didn’t receive any milk or cream for this one so I just used the raspberry compote and the chocolate sauce for my toppings. 

The mixture was SUPER thick once I added the eggs and no matter how much I mixed it, nothing was changing. It was very much like cake batter so I added 100ml of water and this loosened it up slightly but it was still far too thick for pancake batter. It wasn’t easy to transfer into the pan or to shape it. Also found an issue with the batter as the middle wasn’t cooking evenly or throughly. It was just too thick and the outside was burning before the inside was done. 

It tasted ok with the raspberry compote and sauce but it wasn’t a pancake texture, it was more muffin texture and very dense. In the main picture the decorations are walnuts & cherries as the topping but these aren’t provided and it would be nice if they were as they are pictured.

Chocolate pancakes got a 5/6 out of 10 for me and Nick wasn’t impressed with them at all. 

The next mixture I made was the Banana Pancake mix.

The topping for this one was slightly more complicated and complex so I decided not to roast the banana as it isn’t something I would usually eat and Nick wouldn’t eat it either. 

I added the 3 eggs to the mixture and the 100mls of water it asked for and it was once again really thick. It was the texture and smell of banana muffins and it states they are meant to be crepes. It definitely isn’t thin enough to be a crepe mixture and there was nothing I could do to thin it out without making it too watery. 

I asked Nick’s opinion on the mixture as he makes pancakes quite often and it agreed too that it was too thick for crepes but that it might make ok thick pancakes so I persevered.

I had to put it in the fridge for 60 minutes but I’m not entirely sure why and also it was meant to be smooth but this was SUPER lumpy. I followed all of the instructions, measurements and timings to the t and I’m still not sure how it went so wrong. 

I 100% couldn’t make crepes with it as it was too thick of a mixture but I attempted thick pancakes which again burnt on the outside before the inside was throughly cooked. 

The hob wasn’t too hot and the pan didn’t have too much oil in it so there wasn’t much of a way around this. I’m not a total novice when it comes to making pancakes and these were totally baffling me as to why they weren’t working properly. In all honestly it was very frustrating. 

My bag of dark chocolate drops didn’t melt very well or evenly but it was done enough for the topping. I topped it with the chocolate “sauce”, maple syrup and the toffee / caramel sauce.

The banana ones weren’t all edible but the ones that were, tasted ok but it was definitely a 4/5 out of 10. I was really disappointed as I wanted the crepes to be awesome. 

The last one I made was the Tropical Pancake Mix.

I’m not a tropical food fan myself. The UHT milk and whipping cream we did receive for this one was out of date so couldn’t use it which was a shame as we didn’t have it for the other pancakes. Also as mentioned above the tropical curd had mould in it so we only had coconut flakes for decoration which made it a little dry.

Much like the other mixes, this one was way too thick and I wasn’t going to add water to this one as it didn’t call for it but I ended up adding 100ml to try and thin it out a little. It didn’t make much a difference though. They smelt nice cooking but they were raw inside and burnt outside as it was impossible to get the mixture thin enough for them cook evenly as it was SO thick. I didn’t try these ones as they weren’t edible but had they been I reckon it would of been a 4/10. 

I will be sticking to my old faithful in pancake recipes as I know it works but if you do fancy trying this kit then head over to the website here. I have a YT video of me making them which should be up on the channel shortly.