Crepes are a much-loved food in our house, in savoury and sweet varieties. Recently, I keep seeing/hearing about crepe cakes (okay, mostly from ASMR videos I watch—if you love ASMR check out SAS ASMR on youtube) and I really want to try one but I haven’t been able to find one in my area. So, I decided I’d try to make my own!
I’ve made crepe before, years ago, and I remember that they took some finesse and having a proper pan really helped. With my hands often being stiff and not cooperating, it seemed as though crepe making might become a frustrating venture but I decided to look for a good pan on Amazon, anyway. In your head, please cue the sound of the heavens opening and angel singing because I found the most amazing tool for making crepes. I cannot rave enough about how easy this thing is to use. Perfect crepes every time! It does also make tortillas, according to the package, but I haven’t tried it for that so I’ll stick to its crepe-making abilities for this post.
If you love crepes this is THE thing to have and you can find it here at Amazon: https://amzn.to/2M8i9Zg
Here is what comes in the box:
For my first attempt at a crepe cake I decided to go with a lemon lavender honey cream cake. I doubled this recipe for the crepe batter: https://www.allrecipes.com/recipe/16383/basic-crepes/
The double recipe made about 25 crepes using this crepe maker (I admit I lost count at 21 when I started assembling my crepe cake). I also added a tablespoon of vanilla extract to the doubled batter since I was going to be making a sweet crepe cake.
One thing of note is that I often do read the comments on recipes before making them, because knowing how other people’s tweaks helped them is often useful information. A few people mentioned being confused about mixing the flour and eggs together and that had sounded strange to me as well so I did what many others did; I mixed all the wet ingredients together and them added in the dry ingredients. I was incredibly pleased with the results and I will use this recipe again.
The rest is so simple that, literally, a child could do it (one that is old enough to understand not to touch the hot black surface of the crepe maker, of course). This is also something that could be done from a seated position if you’re in a seated mobility device or you need to sit for any reason.
You plug the base into the wall and leave the black and white “paddle” piece on it to heat up with the on/off switch in the “on” position. It heats up quickly and from there you are a production line of crepe-y goodness! Pour some crepe batter into the shallow dish provided, dip the hot black side of the paddle into the batter and count to 3, turn it over and place it back onto the base. The edges of the crepe will begin to curl up and that’s your cue to turn it upside down onto a plate and return to the dipping stage. In no time, you have a stack of crepes.
I juiced one lemon into a mug and removed any seeds before adding two heaping tablespoons of lavender honey from Planet Bee Honey Farm and putting that into the microwave for 45 seconds. It melted into a liquid.
I assembled my cake by putting a crepe on the plate, brushing it all over with the lemon honey mixture, topping with a layer of stiffly whipped cream, another crepe, another brush of lemon honey, a thin layer of whipping cream, repeat, repeat, repeat. I think in the end my cake was 18 or 19 layers. I was focused more on the task than the counting.
Next, I put the whole cake back in the fridge for about half an hour to firm everything up. When I cut into it with a sharp knife it cut easily and I was impressed with the results. It was tasty and beautiful!
Above: I garnished plates with lemon and strawberries.
Above: look at all those luscious, creamy layers!
Everyone loved it and I will definitely make it again soon. I’ve had two household members request that the next one involves Nutella and I’ll be happy to oblige!