Crêpes? Spinach. Or mushroom. But I'm more likely to make blintzes. Not those nasty sweet ones they sell, but real ones which have a thicker, eggier pancake than a French crêpes, and a hoop cheese filling that's more salty than sweet (that is, if one can find hoop cheese nowadays).

I often fill them with spinach and/or mushroom, and I've decided that for dinner tonight I will fill the remaining ones with turkey and mushroom, partly because that is what I have. Normally I bake the savory ones with a velouté sauce on top, and I might add some Asiago cheese, since I have that as well.

I think cream cheese (or perhaps ricotta) might be a good substitute for the crème fraîche that I used if I want to make a sweet filling, but that will be for another time.

I do not think I've ever had blintzes, and so I'll have to look into that.

I checked the leftover crêpes and found out that there were only seven left over, which means that my recipe makes 20 crêpes instead of 24. I'll have to remember that in the future. I think there are still enough for dinner tonight, however, but I filled them a bit fuller than I normally would.

If you're going sweet and want a cheese, nothing beats mascarpone. Just set it to drain for awhile to thicken it up.

Blintzes look a bit like tamales without the ties. Fold in the top and bottom, then the sides, and place fold side down. They should have a little sweetness, but are basically savory, with a bit of acidity in the filling, and they're browned in the oven for just a hint of crispness (unless it's someone like my great-grandmother cooking, who did them dark brown and crunchy). Served with applesauce and sour cream, or for fancy a fruit compote. If they're white pale, crêpe thin pancake, rolled like a taquito, or sweet like cheesecake, they're some kind of weird American hybrid, not real blintzes. Like rainbow bagels.

Mascarpone sounds good for sweet crêpes - I did not think of that, and it's not something I normally have on hand, whereas I did have crème fraîche that I had bought for German apple pancakes and had in the fridge.

I'll have to look for hoop cheese, as that is also a new one for me.

They look good. I like crepes with just butter and sugar.

A trick that makes really light crepes is to use half flour and half cornflour.

Lars, if you find it please tell me where! You can substitute a dry farmer's cheese, and I've been thinking about ricotta salata. Hoop cheese used to the the most common cheese sold, at least at mercantiles. For blintzes, it has to be fresh. You can get aged in the South still, and parts of the Midwest. I keep hoping to find an easy small batch recipe to make at home, because so few stores have it nowadays. Apparently, which it was easy for actual people to make it in large volume in the old days, which is why it was so common, no one has found a good way to automate it.

Leftover crepes freeze well. Wrap snuggly in plastic wrap, then foil. I place mine on a small pizza pan (lined with parchment, wrapped with plastic wrap and then foil) so they stay flat in the freezer. To keep them separated, I cut the center out of the plastic lids from #10 cans and use them as dividers (or any plastic lid from food containers). I also purchase plastic cutting boards (Wal-Mart - package of 3) and cut them to fit different sizes for separating things I need to freeze (like sliced quick breads).

I recently made Quinoa Crepes, a gluten-free version from Sue Gregg using her famous "Blender Breakfast Crepes" recipe. I made Chicken Curry Crepes and Cheesy Spinach Crepes - all from her "Breakfasts....with Blender Batter Baking Allergy Alternatives" Eating Better Cookbooks. Other recipes from her books using crepes: Apple-Walnut, Banana Cream, Cottage Filled Fruit, Curried Egg, Lemon Fruit, Fresh Apple, Peach-Pineapple. I think I've tried all of them over the years.

Yet one more blender recipe: http://www.passionatehomemaking.com/2008/11/blender-crepes.html

Lars, they look and sound great. You definitely need to try blintzes! I've only made blintzes once and they were absolutely fantastic and I had just 'winged' the cheese/cream filling based on what I had available, then served with homemade jams. I haven't yet tried making gluten-free crepes, so this post inspires me to give it a try. :)

What are commonly called "Swedish Pancakes" in Minnesota (and always served with lingonberries) are not quite crepes. They're a bit thicker than crepes but significantly thinner and airier than regular pancakes. Crepes are a much closer approximation than pancakes, but still not quite a Swedish pancake.

I've not found a Swedish pancake recipe that was significantly different from the crêpe recipe that I use. How do you make your Swedish pancakes? Do they require a special pan? I use a steel French crêpe pan for crêpes, and it has become seasoned over time.

partymusic, I use a crepe recipe that takes cornstarch instead of flour and we actually like them better than the wheat flour crepes, plus I find them easier to handle and flip.

Annie

Annie, do you just replace all regular flour with all cornstarch for those crepes? I know what you mean about liking a GF recipe better than a version made with regular AP (wheat) flour -- I have a few GF versions of things that I think are better too.

DH makes crepes every Sunday morning. The standard here is to pour about a tablespoon of real maple syrup on a plate-sized crepe, roll tightly (like a jelly roll) and drizzle a little more syrup on top.

I serve seasonal fruit and berries on the side as well as jams, marmalades, and yogurt. People often mix & match those in or on their crepes.

We serve a tray of crisp bacon on the side. Lattes for adults. Chocolate milk for kids. Every. Sunday. Morning. This has been our tradition for decades ;)

I use rice flour in my crêpes, but not that much. I would also like to try the cornstarch version, if you have a recipe for that. I should make crêpes more often. For me, the only drawback was waiting one hour or more for the batter to rest in the fridge, but I generally start breakfast way before Kevin is ready for it. Crêpes can sit around, in case I make them too early, although I think it's better to add the powdered sugar just before serving. I thought I had an aluminum sugar shaker for powdered sugar, but I could not find it. I have a plastic one, but it has flour in it.

party_music, I found the recipe on line by looking up cornstarch crepes. They have all cornstarch instead of flour but are the same otherwise. I make them in my blender. I always leave the sugar out, I don't use lemon because mother is allergic and only use the vanilla if I'm quite sure they are going to be filled with something sweet. I use skim milk or whole milk or whatever I have on hand. I've even used almond milk and they worked OK, although I wasn't so fond of the flavor (I don't like any of the "fake" milks). I'm betting just water would work since you have fat in the butter and the eggs. Or maybe orange juice and some orange zest, and some of that mascarpone we've been talking about. Hmmm.....I feel experiments coming on!

Cornstarch Crepes

3 eggs
l cup milk
1 tsp. vanilla,
3 tbls. melted butter
3/4 cup corn starch
pinch salt,
1 tbsl. sugar,
lemon zest.

Add all ingredients to blender and blend well. I use about 1/3 cup per crepe but if you are more dexterous than I am you can make them thinner. About 45 seconds per side and they are done. These seem to be less fragile than when made with wheat flour and everyone loves them just as well!

Annie

I think I've had crêpes similar to that at my favorite Vietnamese Restaurant in Culver City, and they were called Banh Xeo and were filled with crab meat, bean sprouts, lettuce, and shiitake mushrooms, plus nuoc mam on the side. Theirs is a beer batter, however, and had turmeric in it, but I do not think they were made with flour. They may have used rice flour, however.

Here is a recipe from the Slanted Door Restaurant in San Francisco - not my favorite Vietnamese Restaurant in SF, but still interesting. I prefer ones on Clement Street in the Avenues, but this recipe does use both cornstarch and rice flour but no wheat flour.