Cooking diary #3: The story of discovering the perfect French Crépe recipe

Despite how odd it sounds but my dearest one does not like sweets. However, there is one thing that he can never say no to - French Crêpes. I didn't know that until we moved to France. I did attempt making them before of course since I found it way more appealing than usual pancakes but after countless failed attempts to follow recipes online and YouTube tutorials I still could not make a proper one.

We just moved to France and we were looking for a fun way to learn domestic French outside the class too when my husband had a "light bulb" moment - why don't we get an authentic French cooking book? We both enjoy cooking, all sorts of dishes from all over the world, however up to that point French cuisine was slightly neglected. That seemed like a perfectly logical solution.

It was a lovely Saturday morning. We got lucky that this urge to explore French cuisine did not come on Sunday because turns out that on Sunday all shops, cafes, restaurants and even grocery stores are closed. That was one more thing we learned in a hard way after moving in here, but it is a story for the other time...

Fast-forward a few hours later we came back home victorious holding in our hands not one but three cooking books!

No need to say, rest of the day was spent browsing these books, looking for the interesting recipes and... translating them! Turns out that it was a brilliant exercise, we not only learned some kitchen tricks that French use to make their exquisite meals but also expanded our French vocabulary. Two birds with one stone :)

My primary target was the sweets' section. I love a good food, but after that, a delicious dessert MUST follow! Even though I do not count Crêpes as dessert but this was something that caught my eye first. I was amazed when I realized that the recipe that I found in the book was something entirely different from my vision of what ingredients are used to make a French Crêpes. I had to translate it twice, just to make sure that I did not misinterpret something... turns out that I did not.

To my surprise, Crêpes were made with plenty of milk, eggs, and butter. I should have realized that before. Despite the flat look of the crêpes (and mentioned ingredients normally makes pancakes puffy), these are the main ingredients that makes French sweets and food all in all so delicious. One more thing - a powdered sugar. In all my previous attempts I used a granulated sugar and it never crossed my mind that powdered sugar might be lighter and better alternative. In addition, I must warn you, it is not a lean food at all. None of the real French treats are.

So far so good, Sunday was the time for trials. Followed the recipe and the result was amazing! No failures! For the first time in my life, I could proudly put the plate of "vrai" (real) Crêpes on the breakfast table. My second half surprised me even more after admitting that he loved it (and now every time when I make them he is always nearby trying to steal a piece during the process... that must be something keeping in mind that it is pretty much impossible to make him eat even his own birthday cake.)

To be completely fair, I slightly cheat. The original recipe for Crêpes Suzette is a bit more complicated than the way I make it. It does also involve a specific garnish and even actually setting Crêpes on fire for a moment, but I do not feel comfortable yet with such an advanced techniques. Remember - baby steps to perfection :)
However, I did replace garnish with something else - a light orange and honey mixture that goes very well and creates a lovely mild taste.

The recipe:

Ingredients for 24 crêpes:

• 200 g all purpose flour
• 500 ml milk
• 200 ml water
• 100 g melted butter
• 5 eggs
• 100 g powdered sugar
• fine grated zest of one well-riped orange
• a pinch of salt
• Vegetable oil (for cooking)

For garnish:

• 1 freshly squeezes orange juice (can be with pulps)
• 2 tbs melted honey

Instructions:

1. Put flour into the large bowl and mix it with milk and water well, so there are no lumps left. Add a pinch of salt and put the batter aside to settle down for about 30 minutes.
2. Meanwhile, separate egg yolks from whites in two separate bowls. Mix well egg yolks with powdered sugar, melted butter, and orange zest. Whip egg whites separately until the fluffy texture and carefully add them to the mixture with egg yolks'.
3. Slowly mix together the batter and the eggs' mixtures until you get a smooth and runny texture.
4. Preheat the skillet with a bit of vegetable oil. The skillet has to be well preheated on the high temperature, but later for baking use a medium heat.
5. Pour in the batter - just enough to fully cover the bottom your skillet. Crêpe should not be very thick. Cook untill you see that edges of the Crêpe are lifted up and getting golden - it is a time for turning it over. All in all, since the Crêpe is not a think pancake there is no need to fry it for long.
6. Before adding the mixture for the next Crêpe , do not forget to add a little bit of vegetable oil again and heat it for a moment. Rinse and repeat.

Instructions for garnish:

1. Melt the honey and mix it with freshly squeezed one orange juice. As simple as that.

I hope you'll enjoy it as much as we do.
Bonne appétit!
<3