My Beautiful Paris

French Cooking Part Five: Crêpes

Thursday May 8, 2014

Cooking with your spouse is a completely different ball game. Niceties and pleasantries go right out the window! At least they do in my competitive little kitchen.

Banging into each other, ripping kitchen utensils out of each other's hands, a few frisky slaps on the behind, waving spatulas in the air, and yelling out orders like "are you rolling them or folding and rolling them?!"(I still don't know what he meant by that): that's more like it.

My innocent cooking expedition quickly turned into a competition over who knows best and who could cook up the nicest looking crêpe. Honestly! Bring. It. On. Cheffy.

I decided to cook crêpes with my husband because we have enjoyed a multitude on our trips to Paris. I felt it was the perfect end to my home French cooking project before the big finale at the kitchens of the Shangri-La Hotel in Paris.

The Martha Stewart recipe we followed is seriously simple. All you need is: 4 large eggs, 1½ cups of whole milk, 1 tablespoon of sugar, 1 cup of all-purpose flour, ¼ teaspoon of coarse salt and 3 tablespoons of melted unsalted butter. Oh, and a blender. That's it!

Combine the ingredients in your blender. Scott took on this job since there was a machine involved. Boys!

Purée until the mixture is smooth and bubbles form on the top. Let the batter sit for at least 15 minutes (we let it sit for ten minutes since Scott and I both suffer from zero-patience syndrome).

Heat a 12-inch nonstick skillet over medium. Lightly coat it with butter. Add a 1/3 cup of batter and swirl to completely cover the bottom of the skillet.

Do not make the mistake a certain someone made by thinking 1/3 cup of batter is not enough. It is! As a result our (ahem, his) first crêpe was a bit of a disaster. Scott's motto? "If you obey all the rules, you miss all the fun!" Geesh.

A 1/3 of a cup is just perfect. See!

Cook until the underside of crepe is golden brown. Then loosen the edge and flip it over using your spatula and fingertips.

The aroma filling the kitchen was making our stomachs growl, especially Oscar's. 

We were nearing completion when I decided to include our little doggy in the fun. So, I made a wee teeny tiny one just for him. As I handed it over I begged Oscar to enjoy and savour the flavour because he was only getting one. He looked up at me, and the look in his eyes said 'shut up mummy, and hand it over!' Gulp—it was gone!

The crêpes turned out perfectly! There were a variety of fillings from blueberry jam to Boursin cheese to dark shaved chocolate, which melted beautifully. There we were, devouring as many as our tummies could take. 

Thank you, honey for taking part in my French Cooking project and spicing it up with a bit of feistiness and entertaining rivalry. XO.

Next up: French Cooking in Paris!!!