This yummily looking slice, suitable for dessert, a gluten free birthday cake replacement, afternoon tea or a dish for a High Tea, is made from crepes, lemon juice and sugar.
So pretty, delicate and delicious and another lesson in what posh looking things you can make when the pantry looks very bare.
You need one quantity of basic crepes, the lemons and sugar, and a pretty platter for serving. That's it.
Basic crepes:
3/4 cup plain flour (I use gluten free, just a commercial blend)
1/4 teaspoon salt
3 eggs
1/4 cup oil
1 cup water
Whisk all ingredients in a large pouring jug, until smooth. Refrigerate 30 minutes or overnight to improve texture of cooked crepes. It should look like thin pouring cream.
Put a knob of butter or marg in a square of paper towel, heat a non-stick round frypan, and rub the wadded paper towel over the base of the pan to grease very lightly. You don't want more than a mere whisper of butter coating the pan. Sprinkle with a few drops of water and if they sizzle, the pan is ready.
Working quickly, pour about 3 tablespoons of batter into the pan, and swirl to cover the base. I pour the batter into the pan in a thin stream and count to 3. That's usually about right.
Cook until the crepe dries out on top and the lacy edges start to lift from the pan. It's then ready to flip. Cook for thirty seconds on the flip side, and slide onto a flat platter to cool.
Repeat with remaining batter.
You should get 12-15 dinner plate sized crepes from this amount of batter.
Allow the crepes to cool. You can hasten this by refrigerating them if you wish.
Now the fun part. You can layer the crepes with anything you wish. Nutella, whipped cream and thick custard, chocolate philly cheese, lemon or passionfruit curd and jam are all obvious choices.
We made ours with the traditional filling of sugar and lemon juice. Our favourite :)
For the filling:
2 lemons, halved, seeds removed
1 cup sugar (or thereabouts)
Icing sugar to dust
Lay one crepe on your pretty serving platter.
Sprinkle with about a level dessertspoon of sugar. Squeeze fresh lemon juice over it to moisten and top with another crepe. Repeat until all the crepes are used.
Refrigerate for at least thirty minutes if you can stand to wait that long, so that the flavours permeate the crepes. Some lemony syrup will accumulate at the base of your crepe stack. Just spoon that back over.
When you're ready to serve, cut the crepe stack into slices or wedges, and serve on little plates with icing sugar sifted over the top. Yoghurt, cream or ice cream are a nice accompaniment.
Yummmmmm....for mere cents.
