Crepes au Citron

I woke up this morning in a bit of a panic “aah, i haven’t done a pancake post and it’s pancake day tomorrow!” Now i’m sure that a lot of you out there are thinking, “er, calm down, it’s just pancake day and also, you’re a bit of a weirdo”. This may be very true, but i’m a serious fan of pancake day, you can have thick ones, thin ones, ricotta ones, buckwheat ones, souffle ones- the list goes on and on. You can make them sweet or savoury and put pretty much anything in them or on them that you can think of and it’ll probably be delicious. Given that i have to run out the door in a couple of hours to a two hour salsa class (i am going to be such a pro in a few weeks, just you wait and see) i don’t have much time to do anything too elaborate. Also i’m guessing that most of you don’t want to spend hours making something anyway, you just want to consume as many pancakes as possible on the one day a year that it’s not seen as weird. With that in mind, i thought i’d share one of my favourite recipes, it’s a French classic and a twist on the good old lemon and sugar. If you wanted to make savoury crepes/pancakes then simply leave out the 10g of sugar in the batter and you’re good to go. Happy pancaking everyone!

Crepes au Citron- makes enough for 4 people

125g plain flour
1 large egg, beaten
pinch of salt
10g caster sugar (for sweet ones only)
300ml whole milk
20g butter, melted to nut brown

60-100g caster sugar
2 lemons
50ml water

First of all, get your batter on the go as you need to let it rest for a while. Sift the flour, sugar and salt into a bowl (and actually sift it, no one likes a lumpy crepe).

Make a well in the centre and add the beaten egg.

Start to whisk and then gradually add the milk until you have a smooth batter.

Melt the butter and cook it until its brown an smells nutty-not black and smells burnt.

Add to the batter. Cling film the bowl or pour into tupperware and let it rest in the fridge for 20-30 minutes, this will help ensure a nice smooth batter.

In a saucepan, put the sugar, the juice of one lemon and 50ml of water and bring to the boil. I’ve given quite a variable amount of sugar as it’s completely dependent on how sweet you like things, i love really tart lemony things so i only use 60g but you’ll probably want more so just keep adding sugar and tasting until it’s sweet enough for you.

While the syrup is heating, supreme the other lemon. To do this, you cut off the top and the bottom of the lemon and then cut off the skin around the outside, making sure to remove all the white.

Next, cut between the membrane of each segment so that you end up with all the segments devoid of anything around them.

Once the syrup has come to the boil, take it off the heat and a the lemon segments.

Next up, make your crepes, wipe a little flavourless oil around your pan, i like to do small ones as i think they’re cuter but do whatever size you like. Bring your pan up to a medium heat and add just enough batter to cover the bottom of the pan. Cook one side, then flip. You only want them lightly coloured, don’t let them get too brown.