Eating Crespelle in time for Pancake Day

Every year since Meals with Morri began, I’ve missed two extremely important days of the year. More often than not, it would be a day later when everyone shares their take on the celebrations, and more often than not, I’d curse loudly.

But I was determined this year. I finally made it, and it came out beautifully. Finally, I was able to celebrate Mardi Gras, also known as Pancake Day!

As a kid, I didn’t eat pancakes as a way to indulge before Lent. I usually wore green, gold, and purple plastic beads and masks at school, and ate King Cake at home. Beyond that, it was just a fun way to mark the forty days before Easter. But with a food blog, I was more focused on pancakes.

There are two days that specifically celebrate pancakes during the year (as if you’d need a reason): Mardi Gras, or Shrove Tuesday, which falls on various dates depending on the year, and National Pancake Day (U.S.), which falls on September 26th. The former was historically to use up all of the indulgent ingredients before fasting. The latter is widely celebrated but is informal, kind of like someone saying:

“Hey man, we should get, like, as many people as possible to eat pancakes today.”
“Why?”
“Why not?”

I’m celebrating pancakes today. And upon further speculation, I realize Meals with Morri needs more pancake recipes.

Every country seems to take a different spin of what a pancake is. CK is a firm believer that pancakes and crêpes are different food dishes, and will often jokingly sigh and say, “They say pancakes, but they mean crêpes.” Personally, I think they are related: both are a flat griddled cake that varies in thinness, although he is technically right. Culinarily speaking, there is a difference between the two, and how they are eaten varies. Pancakes, thin or thick, are typically laid flat and eaten with toppings whatever ingredients you can think of. They also can have additional flavors added to the batter. Crêpes, however, can and do have toppings, but they also have fillings and are either folded or wrapped to accommodate them. Other than spices, adding anything remotely lumpy to crêpe batter will lead to a lumpy crêpe. And that's no buono.

But to celebrate being in Italy, I’ve included crêpes as part of Pancake Day. Why? Because, to me, pancakes and crêpes are family, and each country makes the dish its own unique way. Italians call their version crespelle. They appear to have the same ratio of ingredients as the French crêpe, but they have a multitude of uses I wouldn’t think to incorporate for recipes. They are baked, used much like lasagna noodles. They are cut up into slivers and put in soups. But they are also used like I have seen them prepared: filled and topped with amazing combinations. 

It's wonderful.

I’ve made crêpes twice before now, but this was a dish that CK believed I’d outdone myself with. The batter was perfectly thin and the crespelle themselves were easily flipped. There were no modifications I wanted to make on the flavor. He was right: we could do a lot of different things with this crespelle recipe. And believe me, we will.

I even made a video on my YouTube channel to show you how to make it!

I modified Manuela Zangara’s recipe for crespelle, which can be found on her food blog Manu’s Menu. The filling was the result of my asking a few of my Italian friends what fillings I should use, and someone replied by saying radicchio and cheese. Thus, radicchio and cheese.

Happy Mardi Gras (and Pancake Day), everyone! 

Crespelle with Radicchio and Gorgonzola Piccante

For the crespelle
350 ml milk
2 eggs
75 g buckwheat flour
90 g rice flour
30 ml melted butter
1 pinch salt

For the filling
1 Small red onion, finely diced
1 Garlic clove, finely chopped
1 head of Radicchio longo*, thinly sliced
200 g Gorgonzola Piccante**
100 g Mascarpone
15 g butter
1 tbsp. (10 g) Rice flour

Seasoned red sauce, hot, for topping***

Heat a batch of red sauce on low heat in a saucepan, and either keep warm or set aside for later.
In a medium bowl or pitcher, combine the egg and milk to form a mixture, followed by the dry ingredients and melted butter.
Set it aside for ten to fifteen minutes.
In either a crêpe pan or a large, flat sauté pan (I used a no chemical non-stick pan), melt a small piece of butter or a drizzle of olive oil on medium heat.
When the pan is ready, lift and tilt the pan sideways.
Use a ladle to pour the batter on the lowest side and swirl until the batter covers the bottom completely.
Let the crespella (sing. for crespelle) cook until the surface dries, and then flip to cook the other side for another thirty seconds or so.
Repeat the process until all of the batter has been used up, and set aside to be used immediately or stored for future meals.
Put another sauté pan (or the pan you used to make the crespelle) on medium heat, and lightly drizzle with oil.
Follow with the garlic, onion, and radicchio; cook until soft, and set aside.
Lastly, put the cheeses and butter in a small saucepan on medium-high heat, either directly over the stovetop or with a double boiler; once melted and thoroughly mixed, slowly add the rice flour.
Bring together the ingredients, the radicchio and melted cheese as a filling, and fold the crespelle to your preferred style and shape.
Top with the warm red sauce and serve hot.

Makes 8 crespelle.

*Radicchio comes in a few different varieties, but you will mostly find what are referred to as long (like Belgian Endive) or as a head (like a small cabbage) in your local market.
**Any semi-soft blue cheese would work in this recipe.
***Red sauce = tomato sauce.

(Completely unrelated, but there are apparently parts of Russia where it’s not Pancake Day, it’s Pancake Week. Seriously, why are we not doing this?)

Russian Blini for Two

I am being perfectly honest with you all when I say that this month’s GFRR was hard. I’m not sure it had to do with my mindset, or if it truly was the multiple crepe recipes that weren’t working out. Now, with the final recipe written and posted, I’ve learned a few valuable lessons I’d like to share.

I try really hard not to use this blog as my place to rant about whatever grievance may come my way, as I did my first few months of blogging. And whenever I do talk about things that are less than rays of sunshine, I do what I can to not come off as some whiny, self-centered princess. Every time I do the GFRR with the other amazing participants, I am always humbled by the journey I took to get to that winning (or not so winning) recipe, and also by the recipes the others made.

For this particular challenge, I focused too much in the beginning of what kind of crepe I wanted to make and not at all on making a simple batch successfully. And I do this outside the kitchen all the time: daydreaming the details, doing what I can to making it exotic and outlandish, and not even thinking about mastering the basics first.

As I said, I’ve made crepes before. And yes, this implies I did so successfully. I've made them in a (gasp!) non-stick skillet and recently in a cast iron griddle pan. I expected victory, demanded triumph. What I got was a smack of humility and the Universe telling me to chill the crepe out. If you want to make something as temperamental as crepes, you have to have a cool head, patience, and remain optimistic even when you mess up a crepe (or, you know, half the batch… twice in a row).

Michael Ruhlman called crepes a “vehicle” (Ratio p. 81). I know he meant literally, as in “a vehicle for foods and flavors.” But for me, food is just as figurative as it is literal. Figuratively, the crepe is a vehicle for introspection and perspective. You know where you are in life when you make crepes. If all goes well, and you have a batch of freshly made crepes on a plate just waiting to be devoured, you start thinking how wonderful your life is and how wonderful you are. And if it doesn’t, if the crepes stick to the pan, break apart when you’re getting ready to flip them, are too thick or too thin or too something else, a storm cloud forms above your parade and you start grumbling “Oh, crepe!” like it was an expletive.

To be fair, even the not so pretty crepes in the batch tasted just fine, so I don’t think it had anything to do with the ingredients. It was the execution of making said crepes: not a hot enough pan, not a thin enough spatula, not a balanced enough stovetop, not patient enough, not a positive enough mentality… the list could go on if I let it.

While making crepes, I struggled to remain optimistic as my spatula pierced through yet another one in my flipping attempts. I started thinking of the uncontrollables and uncertainties I tried to keep from surfacing. As I said before, I don’t like to talk about myself when I’m feeling less than awesome. When things are less than kosher, I become introverted and do what I can to fix it myself so I don’t worry people.

The truth of the matter, my dear friends, is this: health isn’t always a sunny pasture with organic fruits and veggies on rolling hills as far as the eyes can see. While making crepes, I was upset, though upon asking I wouldn’t know what to say. I don’t really talk about my hypothyroidism very much on this blog (as of yet), nor about my adrenals or my internal health. I talk about disordered eating and fitness and my trials with both. I philosophize about food and life and love. The things I don’t talk about are only mentioned in passing, simply because I don’t know much about them except by how they make me feel. And throughout the entire month of February, I was frustrated and upset. Frustrated and upset, because I didn’t know why I was frustrated and upset. Was it a hormonal imbalance? Am I taking too much or too little Armour Thyroid? Why do my hands still have that slight yellowish hue from time to time, and what do my nails say about my overall health? Have I developed hyperthyroidism in my attempts to remedy my hypothyroidism? (These are ask-the-doctor questions, I know.)

I can always tell something’s wrong whenever I begin nitpicking at myself. It usually comes in the form of criticizing my body, and then wondering why my exercising and my eating habits weren’t transforming me into a shorter version of Wonder Woman in a matter of twenty-four hours.

Sometimes the conditions for making amazing crepes don’t happen. Sometimes you don’t understand what’s going on with your body or why your day was laced with moments where all you could say was “Oh, crepe!” Sometimes less than pleasant things happen, like crepes looking like badly formed discs of dough or falling twenty feet from a rock climbing wall and your chin painfully colliding with your chest.

These things happen, and the best thing you can do is brush off the hand chalk on your shorts after climbing or the splatter of crepe batter on your apron.

February and the start of March was a challenge in every right, and T.R. from No One Likes Crumbly Cookies picked the ratio that embodied it perfectly.

The concept for the crepe ratio is simple enough: 1-1-1/2, or one part egg, one part liquid, and half parts flour. (I focused on how much the eggs weighed and went from there.) But when it comes to the science of bringing them ingredients together… that’s where it gets iffy.

Some say to make sure the ingredients are at room temperature before blending, while others don’t even mention it. Some say refrigerate to let the batter “bloom” up to an hour or overnight, while others use it immediately. They vary in the use of a crepe pan, a non-stick skillet, or a cast iron griddle pan. And on what heat I ask you, medium or medium-high?

I tried different liquids, the most notable being the batches I made with sparkling water and goat milk. I tried different fillings for different kinds of crepe dishes, like the ricotta-cream cheese combination for a blueberry blintz recipe. The recipe that I am using for this month’s GFRR was originally going to be little fluffy canapés with random toppings, both sweet and savory. But as time went on, it ended up a little different than I expected. They have a taste of Russia in them complete with sour cream, a cornichon pickle, and chia “caviar”.

So, without further ado
I give you Russian blini… for two.

Russian Blini

2 (119 g) Large eggs
60 ml Goat milk
59 ml Lukewarm water (about 110ºF)
5 g Active dry yeast
3 g Creamed honey
30 g Buckwheat flour
30 g Garbanzo bean flour
1/4 – 1/3 tsp. Sea salt

Coconut oil or butter, for greasing the pan

Pour the eggs and goat milk into the blender and set aside to get to room temperature (at least an hour).
Combine the flours and salt into a bowl to be used later.
In another bowl, bloom the yeast with the water, honey, and at least 10 g of the dry ingredients for twenty minutes.
Add the flour and yeast mixture in the blender and pulse on low until just combined, and allow it to rest on the counter for another hour (you can then make the crepes or put it in the fridge overnight).
Heat your pan over medium heat.
Pour just enough batter to coat the bottom as you tip and tilt the pan.
Allow it to cook untouched until it’s set, at least a minute or so, and then gently turn the crepe and briefly cook the other side.
Remove the crepes to a rack as you make more to be used immediately or allowed to cool.

Makes 6 – 8 crepes. Serves 2.

Want to see what the others of the GFRR made this month? Well, scroll on down and click on their links!

Thank you, T.R. We couldn’t have had a better host for crepes.

Adina | Gluten Free Travelette     Breakfast Crepes Three Ways

Angela | Angela's Kitchen     Savory Buckwheat Crepes with Sweet Potato, Mushroom and Kale Filling

Caitlin | {Gluten-Free} Nom Nom Nom     Buckwheat Crepes

Caleigh | Gluten Free[k]      Banana Cinnamon Crepes

Caneel | Mama Me Gluten Free     Slightly Sweet Crepes with Caramelized Bananas and Nutella Sauce

Charissa | Zest Bakery     Black Pepper Crepes with Chicken Tikka Masala

Erin | The Sensitive Epicure     Socca with Za'atar & Sumac (Garbanzo Flour Crepes)

Ginger | Fresh Ginger     Sweet 'n Savory

gretchen | kumquat     nutella crepe cake

Heather | Discovering the Extraordinary     "Southwestern" Crepes

Jenn | Jenn Cuisine     Braised Duck, Fennel and Chestnut Crêpes

Karen | Cooking Gluten-Free!     Gluten Free Crepes Savory or Sweet

Mary Fran | FrannyCakes     Gluten-free Peanut Butter Crepe Cake

Mary Fran | FrannyCakes     Gluten-Free Vanilla Bean Crêpes Sucrées

Monika | Chew on This!     Dessert crepes with caramelized plantains, toasted coconut and chocolate sauce

Morri (me!) | Meals with Morri     Russian Blini for Two

Pete and Kelli | No Gluten, No Problem     Key Lime Crepes

Shauna | gluten-free girl     Gluten Free Buckwheat Crepes

*T.R. | No One Likes Crumbley Cookies     Brownie Crepes with Strawberry Wine sauce

*T.R. | No One Likes Crumbley Cookies     Basil Tomato and Feta Crepes

*T.R. | No One Likes Crumbley Cookies     Fresh Fruit Crepe

Tara | A Baking Life     Breakfast Crepes with Eggs and Kale

Jonathan | The Canary Files     Vegan Crepes for Filipino Spring Rolls

Rachel | The Crispy Cook     Raspberries and Cream Crepes

Mrs. R | Honey From Flinty Rocks     Crepes - Spinach & Dessert

Grain-Free Savory Crepes

The University was alive in color yesterday. I couldn’t help but be awed by the clouds rolling in the distance while the campus was basking in sunlight. There were girls in maxi dresses and sandals, walking with purpose in their natural feminine swagger. There were boys in their fraternity t-shirts, offering one of their brothers up as a target for a dollar an egg. Groups of twos and threes lazed on blankets in the grass, listening to music, studying, and gossiping.

It was a beautiful day, a gorgeous day in fact, that it seemed like a tragedy to be cooped up indoors. That may just be the most torturous thing a professor could do; deny their students a beautiful day. But really, they are stuck inside with us too, so we really can’t blame them for that.

I bring this up because this was likely one of the very few days I’ve witnessed the George Mason community stopping to smell the tulips simultaneously. As finals and graduation and other hectic things are weeks away, it seemed like the campus decided that there were other things more important than tedious PowerPoint slides and stressing out over which notes are relevant to the upcoming exams.

For once, the Universe and the weather told us concurrently “Enjoy today.” And it was a nice feeling, not taking life so seriously all the time.

I was (and sometimes am) what is called a “worrier”. The worrier is someone who is never at peace with themselves, insecure with what was, what is, and what will be. This is the person obsessed with the past, with all the things they did and didn’t do, all the opportunities that came and went. At the same time, they are equally as obsessed with the future, insecure with their own intuition and thus heading down the path of mediocrity simply because it’s the safest route. My “worrier” was rearing its nagging little head on Sunday, and for most of the night I was thinking of all the things I had to do this week. Mind you, with the workload I had anticipated, I would’ve been able to handle it. But on a Sunday night, when you’re certain the Armour Thyroid dose you’ve been taking isn’t enough and everything looks to be happening all at once… that’s when things get hairy.

Despite my worrier tendencies, I’m not much of a serious person. I do my best to not take life seriously. Does that mean I think life is a joke? Goodness, no! But when I see other college kids tearing their hair out and crying because the header for their final paper is a centimeter off, that’s when life is taken too seriously.

And honestly, there are just not enough hours in the day for such graveness.

I think there is this tacit expectation that we have to get life right every time, to be perfect in everything we do. These expectations, while it may seem like it’s great motivation or wonderful advice, in reality it just adds more and more stress upon the already strained shoulders of the student body.

We already have heavy books to carry around. We don’t need any more pressure.

Seriously though, yesterday couldn’t have been more perfect. Previous tensions seen in old friends’ eyes were significantly lessened, and there was a different mood heard in the voices throughout the campus. It was a lighthearted mood, a celebratory mood, an infectious mood. No one was immune.

I’m not the worrier I was on Sunday, nor the worrier I was on Monday. The things I had been fretting about since last week are no longer anxieties. I celebrate getting the summer internship I applied for. I celebrate having more time than I anticipated. I celebrate the finalization of CARmunity and look forward to next week’s interest meeting. I celebrate my official position as Officer of Diplomatic Affairs and Student Representatives for CARmunity. I celebrate the continuation of my journey in regards to health and healing. I celebrate my friend’s twentieth birthday (Happy birthday, E.!) I celebrate my inspirations, my recipes, and the random things that make me smile.

So remember this: the more time you spend on worrying, the less time you spend on celebrating. If I hadn’t gotten out of my own way, didn’t sweat the small stuff or worry over the things I couldn’t control, I wouldn’t have had the time to make the meal I did.

Although I must admit, I am quite proud of myself.

There seems to be a lot of things I’ve never made before, even BGF. First it was the biskies, now it’s these crepes. My first crepe attempt, actually. As in, my first crepe attempt ever. Grain-free too. And believe me when I say this, I was quite nervous.

Oh yes, my worrier was showing, but not for long.

I followed Ruhlman’s recipe to a “T” this time. I read and reread the directions until I could recite it from memory. I made the batter ahead of time before the boyfriend showed up for another Morri “Classic”. For one millisecond I thought I would screw up the crepes, at least the first one. But then I focused on how exciting making crepes for the first time was, how awesome this recipe was going to turn out, how epic this post was going to be. I came up with a way to getting underneath the crepe cleanly by the third one without hesitation, and the combination of flavors was better than I had expected.

You want to know what I didn’t do? I didn’t take myself seriously. I didn’t sweat it. That, along with my winning attitude and my patience towards every crepe, was the reason behind my success.

After dinner, the boyfriend and I talked about the meal. He and I both agreed that these crepes were to be for savory dishes solely, but I will do another crepe recipe specifically for a dessert or sweet breakfast. I’m thinking coconut, glutinous rice, and amaranth.

Yum.

Grain-free Savory Crepes, Chili Sin Carne Filling, & Kale

For the crepes:
8 oz Milk
4 Large eggs
1.5 oz Quinoa flour
1.5 oz Buckwheat flour
1/4 – 1/2 tsp. Sea Salt, to taste

Combine the ingredients and blend with a whisk or hand blender until they are uniformly combined.
Let the batter rest for half an hour in the refrigerator, up to a day if you would like.  
Heat your pan over medium heat.
If you are using a well-seasoned cast iron or crepe pan, or you have a non-stick skillet, you only need to wipe the surface with some vegetable oil with a paper towel. (If you’re using stainless steel, swirl a teaspoon or so of butter in the pan to coat the bottom).
Pour just enough batter to coat the bottom (I used the 1/4 c. measuring cup for consistency) as you tip the pan.
Allow it to cook untouched until it’s set, about a minute.
Gently turn the crepe and briefly cook the other side, about fifteen seconds.
Remove the crepes to a plate or rack as you make more. (The can be used immediately or they can be allowed to cool. Once cool, stack them, cover, and put in the refrigerator until you want to use them.)

Makes 10 crepes.

For the filling:
1 14.5 oz Canned tomatoes, drained
1 15 oz Canned black beans, drained
1 Small onion, finely diced
2 Cloves garlic, finely diced
1 tsp Chili seasoning (mine was homemade)
1 tbsp Olive oil

Combine the ingredients for the filling in a medium-sized cooking pot over medium heat.
Once the onion has softened, set it to low while prepping the crepes
In a large cooking pot, add the ingredients for the bed of kale on medium to high heat until cooked down.
When the crepes are done and the filling is cooked down, lay out a crepe and place a litter of the filling in the center.
Using your fingers, roll the crepe around the filling. Place the crepe seam side down on the plate so it doesn't open.
Your crepe is now complete. Put as many you think you can on your plate over kale.

For the bed of kale:
1 Head of kale, roughly chopped 
Drizzle of Olive oil
Water (about 1/4 c.)
1/2 tsp Crushed garlic
1/2 tsp Dijon mustard

Turn off the kale when the leaves have wilted and the stems have softened, but the greens still have a vibrant green color.

Serves 2, with a sure chance of leftovers.