Brits Sweeter on Pancake Day Than ‘Commercial’ Valentine’s Flower-Fest

Whether tight-fisted or just badly-organised, husbands and boyfriends will dread the annual last-minute Valentine's Day dash to buy flowers, chocolates, a tacky card, and maybe even a bottle of bubbly for their better halves. But everyone loves a nice pancake.

Pollsters have found cynical Britons think Valentine's Day is just a sales exercise — and are far keener on munching pancakes on Shrove Tuesday.

The eternally un-bothered British are too hard-hearted or penny-wise to really care about splashing out on romantic tokens for their lovers.

With the price of cut roses soaring every year in the lead-up to Valentine's Day and shops full of tacky gifts, just 14 percent of those polled by YouGov thought it was a "proper" special occasion, while 79 percent thought it was only celebrated due to marketing by greeting card companies and the like.

The pollster also dredged up research from four years ago showing that 61 percent of Brits preferred Pancake Day — properly called Shrove Tuesday — to Valentine's.

YouGov polling on British people's preference between Valentine's Day and Shrove Tuesday, commonly known as Pancake Day.

© YouGov

Shrove Tuesday is the last day before the fasting period of Lent, when remaining eggs and milk are mixed up with flour to make pancakes. It commonly falls in February around Valentine's Day, but this year will be on 1 March.

The name comes from the past tense of "shrive" — meaning to confess your sins to a priest — similar in both grammar and sense to "woke".

But like Easter 47 days later, the religious significance has been replaced by a craving for sugary treats, with the humble crepe liberally pasted with syrup, chocolate spread, or the classic lemon juice and sugar.