Everyone should know how to make pancakes.

As I get older, I find myself getting increasingly angry at little things that really shouldn't bother me:

• People who don't put their duffle coats up properly
• Homes that don't have their Christmas trees down yet (I mean, come on. It's late January!)
• People who claim to have found "spiritual enlightenment"
• Men who don't put dirty dishes in the dishwasher (Mr MFC, I'm looking at you)
• Wet towels on the floor

But out of all of those, I think the thing that ticks me off the most is those little 'pour and shake' pancake bottles you see in the supermarket. 

I mean, come on. If you go to the effort of buying a shitty little pancake kit to pour onto your griddle, you might as well learn to make the damn things from scratch. 

It's like four ingredients, and chances are you already have all of them in your cupboard.

So here's how to make pancakes like a real man:

PANCAKES

You will need:

• 6 Tablespoons Self Raising Flour
• 3 Tablespoons Caster Sugar
• 1 Egg
• 4 Tablespoons Semi-Skimmed Milk (plus more to mix)

Bung all of the ingredients in a bowl and stir away until you get a smooth mixture. Then put a couple of splashes of milk in to thin the mix out, until it is about the consistency of a gloopy custard.

If you have one, pour the mix into a measuring jug. Not necessary, but it makes the pouring out onto the griddle part a hell of a lot easier.

Put your griddle on a low to medium heat. If you're not sure, turn the heat down. Better to have a slowly cooked, consistently brown pancake than a pancake which is black on the outside and raw in the middle. Ick.

Pour your mix onto the griddle. How much you pour out depends purely on the size of pancake you want. If you want a bigger pancake for your mix, gently swill out the mixture on the griddle with the back of your spoon.

Wait until the pancake starts to bubble, then use a decent spatula to gently prize the mix from the griddle and flip over.

Wait about 20-30 seconds and your pancake should be ready. Once you've done the initial 'prize and flip', the pancake will be a lot easier to move from the griddle, so don't be scared to do a cheeky flip over to check for sure if it's done.

The amount that this mix will yield depends purely on how big you make your pancakes. I like to make mine pretty sizeable, so I get about three pancakes out of it.

If you make yours a similar size, they should have the following nutritional values:

Calories: 158
Fat: 2 grams
Saturated Fat: 1 gram

Oh yeah, that's another thing that annoys me. Recipes with no nutritional values. When I can, I will always include them. Promise.

Anyway. Now you know how to make pancakes, you never have to buy those silly bottle kits again! Liberating, right?!