Basic Crêpes Recipe
Author and Tante Marie teacher Jodi Liano shares her recipe for delicious, no-fuss French crêpes. She recommends drizzling them with powdered sugar, lemon juice, and extra butter, as she demonstrates in our YDIAW video. We also like spreading crêpes with jam or Nutella, or folding them around fresh sliced strawberries or smoked salmon and crème fraîche. The possibilities are endless.
- 1 cup all-purpose flour
- Pinch kosher salt
- Pinch granulated sugar
- 1 1/2 cups whole milk
- 2 large eggs
- 3 tablespoons unsalted butter, plus more as needed
- Powdered sugar (optional)
- Lemon wedges (optional)
- Place flour, salt, sugar, milk, and eggs in a blender. Mix on high until completely combined, about 30 seconds. Let mixture rest in the refrigerator for at least 30 minutes or overnight. (If the batter separates, mix it again just before cooking the crêpes.)
- When ready to cook the crêpes, melt 1/2 tablespoon of the butter in a 10-inch nonstick skillet or an 8-inch crêpe pan over medium heat. As the butter melts, swirl it around to coat the bottom of the pan. Pour in about 1/4 cup of the batter and immediately swirl and tilt the pan to create a thin, even layer. (If the batter sets before the skillet is coated, reduce the heat slightly. The next crêpe will be better.) Return to heat and cook until the crêpe is golden around the edges and dry in the center, about 1 to 2 minutes. Tilt the skillet, sliding half the crêpe off the skillet and onto a rubber spatula. Flip both the spatula and crêpe over so that the crêpe lands back in the skillet, and cook for about 20 seconds more. (Jodi flips her crepes by hand, but we recommend the spatula method to save your fingers from the heat.) If you choose, use the back of a spoon to spread another 1/2 tablespoon of the butter over the crêpe, then sprinkle with a bit of powdered sugar and a squeeze of lemon.
- Slide the crêpe onto a serving plate and fold it in half, then in half again. Repeat with the remaining batter, buttering the pan as needed (after about every other crêpe). Serve immediately.
How do I double this recipe? Four eggs seems like a lot.
thank you people!
She SAID "Let mixture rest in the refrigerator for at least 30 minutes or overnight." And the overnight is as much necessary as "or 45 minutes...or 2 hours and 3 minutes! Half an hour is enough. If the gluten overdevelops you get the effect of putting baking powder in the batter, be sure to find a cold spot in your fridge, if you really want to let it stand over night. Now about the LUMPS. Here is what you do: When you start, you put in just some tablespoons of the milk and all the flour so you get a VERY THICK piece of mud, this way the flour particles get "rubbed" into the fluid part. You'll see, NO lumps and no mixer necessary. Really, this batter is SO easy and forgiving, do it 3-4 times and you don't even have to measure everything, just put in enough of all the ingredients so your batter has the thickness you remember from your previous crêpes.
This is a fabulous recipe and the process is very well explained. Whisking well ensures that you have no lumps. Also, she said to rest for half an hour or so (not overnight!). Well done, just RIGHT!!! :)
I don't think she's over-complicating things...the recipe works well and really isn't that difficult. I would recommend this one to a friend!
I second the whisk by hand option. All this blending just makes unnecessary mess. I'll even whisk using a fork if I'm in an unfamiliar kitchen that happens not to have a whisk. Also like Tyler above me mentioned don't be afraid to experiment with this in the frying. It tends to be that the first 4 you make will be too thick, you really don't need that much batter in the pan.
Man, you can beat the batter with a WHISK! BY HAND, dammit! And OVERNIGHT??? It takes just TWO minutes, why would I make this one day ahead?(it would make sense if you made too much batter and save some for the other day though). This stupid overcomplicating of the simple stuff is the reason for just-pour-into-pan supermarket bullshit! Also, there is no instruction manual for how to fry pancake or Crêpes. If you ever seen it(in a movie or your mom), just try it, if it goes wrong, try it AGAIN and again! You get better and once you know it, you do the pan-throw-flip! (not so easy with crêpes done with cream, they roll up so easy, flexible little basterds)