Tuesday, February 20, 2007

Breton galettes

We celebrated pancake day this morning with some French-inspired pancakes. Galettes are the very thin lacy, savoury crepes made from buckwheat flour (usually have it in SMBS). Every recipe says to leave the batter for 2 hours but as we wanted ours for breakfast my batter only got 15 minutes of resting which may be why they weren’t quite as delicate as I’d hoped for. And is why I’m showing this nice picture instead of mine.

If you don’t have buckwheat flour, and want to make classic pancakes, use plain flour and switch half of the water for milk. Serve with a squeeze of orange juice and a sprinkling of sugar

Anyway, Shrove Tuesday or Mardi Gras is the day before Ash Wednesday which is when some people give up things for Lent. As Lent means that Easter is coming, it is now no longer too early to buy those little net bags of white chocolate chicks from M&S. Unless of course, you are a giving up chocolate for Lent. It is also traditional for women to have pancake races today. I’ve got my pan and pancake ready but have not yet been invited to any races :(

100g buckwheat flour
pinch of salt
1 egg
250ml cold water
knob of butter, melted
sunflower oil

Whisk together the flour, salt, egg and water to maker a smooth, thin batter.

Heat a tiny splash of oil in a large, non-stick frying pan. When the pan is hot ladle in a little batter. Swirl the pan to spread the batter thinly.

Cook for a moment then turn and top with your fillings (we had cheese and ham). Fold over the corners of the galette so it forms a square.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

i am dashing home to make pancakes for geoff but he really prefers those thick american ones you get for breakfast in a *short stack* with maple syrup. How do you do them?

Silvana said...

Hi Jackie. You mean like these. They're scrummy with crispy bacon and maple syrup.