Lemon and sugar UK's top pick for Pancake Day

More than half of Britons were partial to the classic lemon and sugar pancake, according to a new survey from Tesco.

The UK was set to make millions of pancakes on Tuesday - Pancake Day, or Shrove Tuesday - and the nation's largest food retailer said 52% of the country was likely to choose the citrus-and-simple carbohydrate topping on their flapjacks.

Other toppings that came out as favourites in the informal surveys, taken at five Tesco stores around Britain, included Nutella and strawberries, and maple syrup with bacon.

And while the British classic lemon-and-sugar was the winner overall, nearly two-thirds of tasters in the South of England actually chose the maple syrup and bacon variety as their top pick.

"Shrove Tuesday is a great tome to get creative in the kitchen and experiment with a range of different flavour combinations", said Tesco head of buying Brian Jackson.

"It's great to see, however, that you still can't beat the simple lemon and sugar pancake," he added.

The pancake frivolities seemed to have traders on a mild sugar rush as well - at 1114 GMT, shares in Tesco were up 2.58% to 177.05p.