Quoting
Dexter Sinister
Jeez, how could I have missed this thread the first time around? I make, according to my daughter and her friends, the best pancakes in the world. It's probably not true, but hey, I'll take the accolade, and it's part of some of my favourite memories of her. Sunday morning, after a sleepover where nobody got any sleep, three or four little girls around the kitchen table, I'm making my famous "Daddy pancakes," and the girls are scarfing them down with butter and maple syrup and exclaiming over how great they are. Doesn't get any better than that.
I regret that I can't offer a recipe though. They're different every time, I just throw together what seem to be appropriate amounts of flour, milk, baking soda, sugar, vanilla extract, melted butter, and cinnamon, and whomp the mixture up 'til it looks right. Never had a failure, but never quite had a duplicate either. The only trick is to put the vanilla extract in last, after the baking soda has done its work, if you put it in too soon they won't rise.
Now there is familiar ground.

My daughter, when she was 8 or 10 years old, used to bring two or three of her friends home on a weekend for a sleep-over. I'm not sure when it was that they actually slept. Seems to me they were giggling and chattering the whole night.
For breakfast it was pancakes or waffles. At that time we had a fairly large stainless steel frying pan in which I could cook two medium or four small pancakes. Those four little girls would keep me busy making pancakes for at least an hour and a half.
In recent years my kids bought me a non-stick electric griddle that will turn out six good sized pancakes at one time.
My kids are grown up and married now, with children of their own, but once in a while we still see the pancake gang and occasionally, they get me to make pancakes again. Much easier with the griddle.
