The French Menu Cookbook: The Food and Wine of France - Season by Delicious Season. Richard Olney
dishes, the sugar should be eliminated. One may count on 18 to 20 small crêpes or 10 to 12 large with these proportions.
It is not terribly important to remain loyal to precise ingredients or measurements. Crêpes are good made with milk or beer, with or without the addition of cognac or liqueur, and perfectly acceptable made with water. The batter may be enriched by the addition of cream, may contain more or fewer eggs, and olive oil may replace the butter. Finely chopped fines herbes added to an hors d’oeuvre or main-course crêpe batter is an attractive refinement.
The batter should be thin—the consistency of very fresh cream. The pan should be in impeccable condition. If a large number of crêpes must be made, one may save a great deal of time by working with 2 or 3 pans over different burners. Crêpes may be made in advance, in which case they must be stacked on a plate neatly, one on top of the other, and covered with a towel, to avoid their drying out.
Crêpes
2 heaping tablespoons flour
1 heaping tablespoon sugar (include only in dessert crêpes)
small pinch salt
3 eggs
1 cup milk
1 tablespoon cognac
3 tablespoons (1½ ounce) melted butter
Sift the dry ingredients into a mixing bowl, make a well in the center, and break in the eggs. Stir, keeping to the center, until all the flour is gradually absorbed into the eggs, then slowly add approximately 2/3 cup of milk, stirring all the while. Stir in the cognac and melted butter and thin the batter with milk until it is no thicker than fresh cream. I do not find it essential to let the batter stand before cooking, but this may of course be done.
A small ladle of a capacity of about 3 tablespoons is practical for pouring. For large crêpes (approximately 7 inches in diameter at the bottom of the pan), count about 3 tablespoons of batter, for small (5 inches), about 2 tablespoons. If the batter refuses to cover the bottom of the pan, it is too thick, and more milk should be added.
Heat the pan, lightly buttered (it need be buttered only once, assuming the batter to be sufficiently lubricated), over a low to medium flame (after the first 2 or 3 crêpes, adjust the heat if necessary). If the pan does not sizzle at contact with the batter, it is not hot enough. Lift the pan from the flame and, holding it with one hand, pour in the batter with the other. At the same time, give the pan a rolling motion, turning it rapidly in all directions, so that the batter spreads immediately over the entire surface. Return it to the flame, and after 30 seconds or so, delicately lift an edge of the pancake with the rounded tip of a table knife to check its progress (after one or two times, you will have the feeling and everything will go automatically). Ease the knife blade all the way under and flip the crêpe over. Toss it if you prefer—it is a pretty piece of theater, but requires a certain amount of practice, and the result is the same. After about 15 seconds, remove the pan from the flame, lift the crêpe out with the knife and begin the operation all over again. It is essential to remove the pan from the flame for several seconds each time, for, with the flame at the correct intensity for cooking the crêpes, the pan heats progressively and rapidly becomes too hot. The batter should be stirred each time just before being poured, as the flour has a tendency to settle to the bottom and the butter to rise to the top. If, partway through, the batter is noticeably thicker, more liquid may be added.
HERBS
For my own purposes, I have settled, finally, on the following herbs. Among those to be used fresh: parsley, chives, tarragon, chervil (the traditional fines herbes, alone or in combination), basil, dill, wild fennel, and savory.
Those to be used dried: thyme, bay leaf, rosemary, oregano (wild marjoram), savory and wild fennel.
Others are in my garden, but usually remain untouched. Hyssop I occasionally use—sparingly—when receiving erudite curiosity seekers. Borage, sage, and mint find their place mostly in bouquets (not garnis), and coriander (whose seeds are essential in many brine and vinegar conserves) I planted only once (its tender green leaves, known in French as persil chinois, and in the United States as Chinese parsley, are much used in Arab and Oriental cooking); I found the odor so intensely repellent that I could never bring myself to try it. The only two that I regret not having are cultivated marjoram, neither the seeds nor plants of which I have been able to find in France, and serpolet, a variety of wild thyme, the perfume of which resembles savory more than thyme but is more fragile and delicate than either. In the past, the mountainsides of Provence were covered with it, but for a reason that none can explain it is rapidly disappearing.
A bouquet garni is a bundle of herbs tied together in order to simplify their removal from a dish at the end of its cooking process.
For those who are in a position to raise or collect their own herbs, the following things should be kept in mind:
1. Thyme flowers are finer in flavor than the leaves, but at the moment that the plant is in flower (April through June, depending on the climate), the leaves also have a stronger and more characteristic perfume. The year’s provision is best made at this time.
2. Oregano must be collected when in full flower (July and August). It may be bought in dried bouquets from Italian grocers and, in this form, is always fresher and more fragrant than that found in jars or cans.
3. Perennial savory has a more pungent but finer flavor than the annual variety, which, although useful in the absence of the former, has a vague suggestion of kerosene to its scent.
4. Rosemary is always powerful and may be collected at all times of the year. Although delicious, it should be used with circumspection. Curiously, the smoke of burning or smoldering rosemary is a far more voluptuous and delicate incense than that of any other herb. Any fish, meat, fowl, or vegetable grilled over coals is enhanced if, during the last few moments of the grilling process, a small handful of rosemary leaves is sprinkled over the coals.
A jar of mixed herbs of one’s own confection (for not only does one not know what is contained in the commercial mixtures, but they are always too old, with the result that they lend only a vague, powdery, peppery quality) is practical. Nearly all recipes that call for a complicated dosage of several different herbs are happily supplied by a single pinch of the mixture. The mixed herbs should be dry, but as nearly as possible of the year’s production. Do not be tempted by the miraculous blender to reduce your mixture to powder—the flavor will very rapidly be lost. For those recipes that require a pinch of powdered herbs, it is much the best to pound them in a mortar at the last minute.
Mixed Herbs
1 heaping tablespoon savory
1 heaping tablespoon thyme
1 heaping tablespoon oregano
1 teaspoon finely crumbled rosemary
1 bay leaf, finely crumbled
Cultivated marjoram may, by all means, be added and, if one likes, a couple of leaves each of sage and dried mint, crumbled finely. Store in a small tightly closed jar.
KITCHEN GARDENS
A garden can alter the entire aspect of one’s kitchen and table. Even without a garden, most herbs can still be raised in pots or window boxes, but with a few square yards of garden space, one can plant such hard-to-find and easy-to-grow things as chervil (in French, cerfeuil). For constant production it should be planted every two or three weeks from early spring to early fall—in a shady corner at the hottest part of the season. Sorrel (French, oseille) requires no particular care or special soil, and with a bit of protection during the winter, will produce all year round for four or five years. Wild fennel (fenouil) is another good garden possibility, as are all the semi-wild salads: