A giant pancake marked this year’s Shrovetide—guess how much it weighed!
UŽGAVĖNĖS'25
On Sunday, during the Shrovetide festival in the village of Žibininkai, the giant pancake was prepared by the kitchen masters of the HBH entertainment complex. “Preparing for the record was a real challenge. The organizers had to figure out the best way to flip such a massive pancake, so several different pan prototypes were tested,” said Gintaras Pocius, head of the “Academy of Records” agency, who witnessed the record attempt, according to a press release.
For this purpose, two pans with a diameter of 126 cm were specially made and combined into a single structure to ensure the pancake could be flipped and baked evenly. “Rehearsals” for the pancake took place almost daily for more than a week, so by the day of the event the whole team, led by Onutė Jockuvienė—who has worked as a head chef for 25 years—felt fully prepared for the challenge.
The record-breaking pancake took about an hour to bake. While the yeast dough, prepared that morning, was rising and the team was making final arrangements, the crowd of thousands gathered at the Shrovetide festival was far from bored. In the forest of Žibininkai, within a space created by artists from Vilnius and the seaside, visitors were introduced to Shrovetide traditions—Lašininis and Kanapinis, the arriving Morė from frozen waters, and colorful masqueraders.
“Most people have forgotten the meaning of the festival. Winter was never seen as an evil, hostile aunt or a ragged scarecrow. Our ancestors treated every season with great respect. Shrovetide is a theatrical, symbolic, and respectful farewell to the cold season. That is what we want to remind people of—reintroducing them to this beautiful celebration,” said Laura Matulevičiūtė, one of the initiators of Pancake Day Park and co-owner of the entertainment complex.
Pancake Records in Lithuania and the World
The largest potato pancake in Lithuania—1 meter in diameter and weighing around 10 kg—was baked in a special pan by supermarket chefs in the summer of 2013 to mark the beginning of the fresh Lithuanian potato harvest. About 35 kg of potatoes, 0.5 kg each of onions and flour, and 20 eggs were used.
The heaviest Žemaitian pancake weighed 12.585 kg, measuring 80 cm in length and 45 cm in width. It was baked in about 50 minutes in the courtyard of Vilnius Teachers’ House during the Shrovetide festival in February 2015. The recipe called for more than 10 kg of potatoes, 2.5 kg of curd, 10 eggs, 0.5 kg of breadcrumbs, other ingredients, and a whopping 25 liters of oil for frying.
Another record belongs to Laimis Dombrovas from Utena, who flipped a thin crepe pancake in the air 150 times. This feat was achieved during the Shrovetide festival at the Lithuanian Open-Air Museum in Rumšiškės (Kaišiadorys district) in February 2013.
But the world’s largest pancake is a true giant: 15.1 meters in diameter, 2.5 cm thick, and weighing nearly 3 tons! It was baked in Manchester, United Kingdom, on August 13, 1994. Numbers like these make it hard to imagine anyone ever breaking this record—and perhaps that’s why it still stands to this day.
