Written By: Chef Peggy Aoki
It’s nearly Fat Tuesday, and all over the world people are gearing up for the celebrations. In Louisiana, the bands, floats and parades are rolling through neighborhoods, dark roux and red beans are in the cast iron kettles and millions of strands of beads decorate trees and porches. Many other parts of the United States are marking the celebration in unique ways with pancake dinners and other traditions.
If you’d like to bring some Mardi Gras celebration into your kitchen, one of the easiest ways is to have pancakes for dinner.
Pancakes have a long association with Mardi Gras because of the ancient tradition of abstaining from rich foods such as eggs and butter during Lent, which begins the day after Mardi Gras. Making pancakes helped to use up these staples. Add a French flair by making crêpes instead and fill with your favorite sweet or savory filling or just a sprinkle of sugar.
The Recipe: New Orleans Sweet Crêpes
Crêpe batter is simple to make, and the crêpes store easily, so you could make them ahead and warm them up.
Ingredients you’ll need for the crêpe batter:
¾ cup flour
½ cup water
½ cup milk
2 eggs
2 tablespoons of melted butter
½ teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon of sugar for sweet crêpes
Recipe procedure for the crêpes:
Whisk this all together and let the batter rest while you heat up a 10 inch skillet over low-medium heat.
Lightly butter the pan before each crêpe.
Use a small ladle to place about ¼ cup of the batter in the preheated skillet and swirl the pan to coat the bottom. It might take one or two tries to figure out the right amount of batter for your pan.
When the edges of the crêpe are lightly brown and the middle looks dry, flip the crêpe and allow it to cook briefly on the other side.
The finished crêpes can be stacked on a plate by the stove as you complete them.
Ingredients you’ll need for the filling:
1/4 cup brown sugar
2 tablespoons of melted butter
1 teaspoon cinnamon
splash of bourbon or rum, optional
Recipe procedure for the filling:
Melt 2 tablespoons of butter in a separate skillet and add ¼ cup of brown sugar and 1 teaspoon cinnamon.
When the sugar is melted, add 2 sliced bananas and allow them to cook for about 2 minutes.
You could add a splash of rum or bourbon if you’d like.
Place a spoonful of the cooked bananas down the center of one crepe and roll into a cylinder and repeat.
Add a scoop of ice cream to the plate.
Spoon any leftover sugar from the pan over the crepes and ice cream.
If you’d like to perfect your crêpe making skills, book a class with a Fēst chef! We’ve got a delicious Chocolate Hazelnut Crêpe Cake class that will take your skills to the next level, or we can design a custom menu together. We’ve also got a delicious Shrimp and Grits with Caramel Bread Pudding menu that will transport you from your stove to the flavors of The Big Easy. Enjoy the season - we hope to cook with you soon!
Fēst, pronounced 'feast', is a collective of Chefs, Pastry Chefs and Sommeliers who teach guided, interactive and completely customizable classes to cooking-curious people of all skill levels around the world.
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