Middle-eastern pancakes

I just had to take a picture of this. As I think I mentioned yesterday, today is very, very hot. Currently 42 I believe. So we decided to go see a film and mooch around the shopping centre. The shopping centre we chose was Eastland in Ringwood, because they had a film we could all agree on - The Favourite. It was a really good plan - the only problem being that when we got there we found that our film was sold out, and as there was nothing else we wanted to see, we just mooched around. Hence we have returned home before the promised cool change. It should be here soon though.

Anyway, as we disappointedly left the cinemas I caught sight of this. Amongst the fast food places there was a Pancake Parlour - which I thought was American and famous for huge servings of thick pancakes smothered in sweet things. But look at today's special.

"Kasbah lamb crepes - Middle Eastern spiced mince lamb wrapped in a French crepe topped with Dukkha (their spelling). Served alongside a crisp Greek salad with a dollop of Greek yoghurt."

As far away from American pancakes smothered in maple syrup as you can get. Indeed it's a very multicultural dish - Middle Eastern filling, French crepe and Greek salad and yoghurt. How? Why?

I went to their website and found that it is one of four summer special dishes. For I imagined that Pancake Parlour is a franchise and therefore all the Pancake Parlours serve the same thing. This is a picture of it, and I have to say it looks quite good. It doesn't look over huge, even the salad looks reasonable.

I must admit I thought at first, that maybe either this particular franchisee was of Middle Eastern origins or else that there were a lot of Middle Easterns in Ringwood. I saw a few obviously Middle Eastern people - one lady even only had her eyes showing, in the shopping centre but not that many really. And if I had thought I would have realised that, being a franchise, there would not be any freedom in what they served. Well I assume that's the case anyway.

So isn't it interesting that the powers that be in Pancake Parlour headquarters here in Australia have decided that Middle Eastern food is a real thing and that they should do something about it. This is obviously not an authentic Middle Eastern dish, but they do have various pastries stuffed with spiced lamb mince. Not sure whether they sprinkle dukkah on top but why not. And they certainly wouldn't serve anything in French crepes. Or would they? I mean Lebanon used to be French didn't it?

In effect it's a clever amalgam of three different cuisines aimed at who? Looking at the people in the shopping centre I would say it's aimed at the ordinary man or woman and his family in the street. So isn't that an indication of the multicultural nature of food in Australia? However awful it actually might be - and it might not be - I think it's absolutely fascinating.

So before I finished this post I decided to look more at the website and was a little surprised to discover that in fact it is an Australian company, founded back in 1965 in Adelaide by four young people who had done a road trip through America, eaten a lot of pancakes and decided they wanted to open a pancake shop in Oz. It started in Adelaide because it was cheaper there - they found a burnt-out deli, but in 1969 they moved to Melbourne - their home town where they now have 11 shops. I don't think it is a franchise, just 11 shops and a head office. I was completely wrong. I have to say that the more I look at company websites the more often I have been surprised. Of course they are a money making venture, but it is interesting to read about how a company came to be.

I assume that Sydney and other capital cities are not included. There is certainly no mention of them.

So there's a little sort of discovery for the day. The evolution of fast food and the birth and rise of a small company - Roger, Helen, Allen and Simon apparently. And also, according to Wikipedia - Scientologists. Oh dear. Now you've disappointed me people! Very interesting though.