Crêpes Suzette

Do you like to play with fire? If so, this is the recipe for you.

Do you like soft and wispy crêpes? Buttery caramel sauces? Bright and seasonal citrus? If so, you should make this dish.



It's pancake day or Strove Tuesday this week. As I've already written about my favourite brown butter crêpe recipe and made a Dusky Caramel and Raspberry Crêpe Cake, I thought I would try something new.

Crêpes Suzette is a traditional French dish. Depending on who you believe, it was either developed in 1896 for the Prince of Wales and his female companion 'Suzette' by the chef Charpentier at Monte Carlo or - more likely - discovered at Restaurant Paillard in Paris in 1889 and named after an actress.

They're also made by Mrs Patmore in Downton Abbey, which adds a little glamour and yet another excuse to try them.

I served these with homemade cinnamon ice cream. I use David Lebovitz's fantastic recipe - you shatter a load of whole cinnamon quills into the base and steep it all overnight. The flavour is incredible. It works really well with a lot of wintery desserts so I try to keep a tub in the freezer.

I haven't written the recipe out as this is already a long one and I've probably written about too many Perfect Scoop recipes as it is. I really recommend you buy the book, I love it and use it all the time. (But, ahem, you can find the cinnamon recipe online in both US and metric here).



I know the recipe seems very long. It's not actually that complicated but I wanted to make sure everything was clear and you could work quickly and smoothly through it. If you prepare everything in advance - I made the crêpes and measured everything else - it's really easy to do with guests and they'll love the dramatic flames.

I've tried this using bought orange juice with a squeeze of lemon instead of fresh juice and it was nearly as good (I still served it with a slice of orange). The first batch of crêpes were half wholemeal but I preferred them with just plain for this. I've also tried it with both navel and blood oranges - both were delicious. I've made two batches of crêpes and four sets of the dish in the last three days - it's that good.

I don't think it's traditional to serve this with slices of orange or with ice cream but I think they finish the dish beautifully. The fresh orange brightens the taste and adds texture. The ice cream gives a creamy temperature contrast and the cinnamon melds beautifully with the caramel and citrus.



Crêpes Suzette
(Crêpes adapted from Delia's Complete Cookery Course, sauce adapted from Matthew Fort and Raymond Blanc here)

For the crêpes:
15g butter
55g plain flour
1 egg
100ml milk
25ml water
extra butter for frying

For the sauce & to serve:
2 big oranges
1/4 lemon
60g caster sugar
50g butter
good splash of Cointreau or Grand Marnier
2 scoops of cinnamon ice cream (optional)

Melt the butter in a big, heavy-bottomed frying pan. Keep heating until the butter foams up and dies down and is full of rusty flecks. Pour into a bowl to cool.

Weigh the flour into a mixing bowl and whisk it to get rid of any lumps. Make a well in the centre and break the egg into it. Start whisking the egg into the flour, slowly incorporating more from around the edges. Once you have a thick paste (about half the flour will still be there), start adding the milk. Keep whisking and incorporating splashes of milk and more of the flour until you have a smooth batter. Whisk in the cooled butter. Add most of the water, reserving a little to adjust if needed.

Heat the frying pan up again and add a little bit of butter. Either transfer the crêpe mix to a jug or find a ladle. Once the pan is smoking hot turn the heat down a bit. Pour some of the mix into the pan at an angle and swirl quickly. Flip when starting to brown at the edges. Once browned on the bottom too, remove to a plate lined with a piece of kitchen paper. Repeat until you've got four crêpes you're happy with (you should have batter for about 6). You can now keep them covered in cling film in the kitchen paper (I dampen the top piece) for a few hours or proceed immediately.

Slice one of the oranges so that you have two slices from the middle to serve fresh, and two ends to juice. Carefully pull the peel off the two slices and set aside. Juice the rest of the orange, the other orange and the lemon into a measuring jug. You should have about 150ml of liquid.

Clean the pan that you made the crêpes in. Have everything ready - a whisk, some tongs or a fork to maneuver the crêpes, the butter, the juice, the crêpes, the alcohol, a small frying pan to heat it, matches, the garnishes, plates.

Scatter the sugar evenly over the surface of the pan. Heat over medium-high heat, shaking the pan slightly every now and then to maintain an even layer. Once the sugar has melted and begins to caramelise, scrape the sides down and swirl lightly so that the sugar colours evenly. Once it has reached a deep golden colour, take off the heat, add the butter all at once and whisk until smooth and frothy. Add the juice in two goes, whisking well between each - it may clump up a bit but will melt down in a minute. You'll have quite a bit of liquid.

Return to the heat. Add the first crêpe to the pan, then carefully turn it over with the tongs/fork, making sure it's totally soaked. Fold in half, then into quarters and move to the side of the pan. Repeat with the next three crêpes until the pan is full of the four quarters. Let the crêpes soak and the sauce reduce a little over the heat for about 1 minute, until you have a deep golden syrupy sauce. Transfer the crepes to the plates with some extra sauce. Add the orange slice and ice cream.

Turn off most of the lights in your kitchen. Quickly add a splash of alcohol to the small frying pan and heat until vapours start rising. Light a match and touch it just inside the pan. Blue flames will erupt - watch for the flickers of gold. Pour over the two plates while still flaming and serve immediately.

(Serves 2)

Blood Orange and Rosemary Tian

Like many others, I came to this challenge with no idea what an 'orange tian' was. It turned out to be a lovely dessert - crisp, shortbread-esque pate sablee smoothed with homemade marmalade, smoothed over with scented whipped cream and topped by orange segments seeped in caramel. 

Despite having never tasted an orange tian before, I decided to play with the flavours. I swapped in blood oranges instead of 'blonde' oranges (as they call them here in Switzerland) as I simply cannot resist their flavour and I thought they would look stunning in the dessert. 

I also decided to be 'daring' and incorporate rosemary. I absolutely love rosemary, but I usually only use it in savoury dishes. I had a hunch it would work well in the cream layer of the dessert. And so my mum walked in on me standing in the kitchen alternately delicately chewing a leaf of rosemary and a segment of blood orange. 

The 2010 March Daring Baker’s challenge was hosted by Jennifer of Chocolate Shavings. She chose Orange Tian as the challenge for this month, a dessert based on a recipe from Alain Ducasse’s Cooking School in Paris.

I was very excited when I noticed that the recipe included making marmalade. I haven't made any jams since I used to as a child with my Grandma. Now I think back to it, I'm not quite sure why I was often left in charge of a big pot of boiling sugar, standing on my little stool by the Aga with a very long spoon. Still, it's one of my most treasured memories of my Grandma. 

The resulting marmalade is really very tasty. I was worried that the pith would still be bitter despite the multiple blanchings, but it mellowed out in the end product. I decided to try and not use pectin and try to use pips instead. Unfortunately my oranges didn't have any pips, but I found a lemon in the fridge and used those instead, tied in a little square of muslin. It firmed up beautifully. 

Another new element was the pate sablee (my accents don't seem to be working, so excuse the lack of them). It's the richest of the french pastry crusts and really very tasty. The method was unusual too - you have to beat the egg yolk and sugar till pale and creamy before adding it to the ice cold butter and flour. I think it would be quite lovely just as biscuits. 

Happily my mum had some old crumpet moulds (which, believe me, are going to be used for their original purpose soon) which I could use as moulds and to cut out rounds of the pastry. I managed to have a bit of a baby-swap with the pastry - I took out the remaining pastry from my Roasted Rhubarb Tarts and used that instead of the sablee! I did think they looked different to others I had seen on the forum but it wasn't till the next day when I spotted my pate sablee dough still waiting patiently in the fridge that I realised my mistake. 

For my tians I used our absolute favourite cream in the world, which stars above. It's unbelievably thick and decadent and has a wonderful flavour that I can never put my finger on. It added a lovely richness to the dessert. On another note, I've always loved the Italian for double cream - doesn't doppia panna create the image of thick, luscious cream dropping off a spoon?

I submerged my spring of rosemary in a sea of the beautiful thick cream and heated it gently to infuse it with the flavour of the herb. It then sat in the fridge overnight before being whipped. When I took it out this morning, I was slightly worried - the cream had set slightly oddly and had small lumps. It seemed to come together when whipped, however. I added a little extra plain whipped cream to smooth it out. I don't think I got quite as much volume on the rosemary cream.  

After having learnt to segment an orange (who knew it was so easy?!) I made my caramel. I was glad that it wasn't my first time making a dry caramel - it's definitely something to get used to and the orange juice really made it foam up.  The orange segements then seeped in half the caramel overnight. When it came to drying them out on kitchen paper I realised we had run out, so they had to make do with coffee filters...

I also found I had to split some of the fatter segments in two to get a nice even layer when placing them in the bottom of the moulds. 

I really enjoyed assembling the tians, with the different layers.  I used the tip off the forums of grating down the edges of the pate sablee to fit the moulds where it had spread during cooking. Amazingly they also easily popped out of the moulds - I just flipped them over onto the plate, peeled off the square of parchment and eased them out. 

They're really tasty - my mum went to try one bite and ending up eating an entire tian. She then spent five minutes going 'MMMMMNN', describing the aftertaste in detail and occasionally saying 'delicious' at random. A success, I feel!

Blood Orange and Rosemary Tian

(Makes four tiny tians and lots of marmalade!)

I don't have time to type all the recipes out today, apart from my changes, but you can find everything you need on the Daring Kitchen website  - just scroll down a little and it'll be there.

My changes - I made half measures of everything except the marmalade. I didn't use pectin in my marmalade, just put some pips in some fabric and heated it for slightly longer. I swapped in blood oranges for the segments and caramel. For the rosemary cream I gently heated the 3/4 of the cream with a sprig of rosemary then left it to seep overnight in the fridge before whipping the rosemary cream and then adding the gelatine. I then beat the remaining 1/4 of the cream and folded that in. 

My Version of Nigella's Clementine Cake

I love almond and citrus cakes. Just a look at my recipes list will confirm this. I first made this infamous cake with the requisite clementines a few years ago and we all loved it. I remember taking the last half of that cake to a New Year's Eve party and being quite miserable to watch the last few slices dissapear as the clock counted down. 

This time I decided to chop and change it a bit - mainly by using blood oranges. The result is really quite delicious - dense, damp, with that wonderful blood orange taste and the most incredible texture on the tongue. 

The first time I tried to make my changed version was on Mothers' Day - I had been plotting about it for ages and I knew my mum would love the idea. But then it wouldn't have been a typical Mothers' Day without me nearly destroying her kitchen: I left the oranges boiling in their water too long - they boiled dry and ruined the pan there were in, getting a bit scorched themselves, as you can see above! Bit of a whoops moment. I made another cake for her but failed to get proper photos, and then followed with my Sticky Toffee Pudding Volcanoes. 

And so I set about making it again yesterday. I changed a few things around from the original recipe: I used the blood oranges instead of clementines, I substituted soft brown sugar for some of the caster sugar, and I added an additional fresh orange. I couldn't make up the right weight with whole oranges so I decided to add a peeled orange to the pulp later, which was about right - it brightened the pulp up and I think contributed to being able to taste the distinct blood orange tinge in the final cake.  

Thankfully this time it went well. I have to admit to having a few doubts when I tasted the mixture, but not to fear, it tastes lovely.  I nearly burnt it but thankfully it held out - helped by the extensive wrapping and foiling needed to protect any cake in my mum's oven as you can see above.... (She's getting the kitchen re-done soon so the oven will stop tormenting me soon, I can't wait.)

Unfortunately the blood oranges I used weren't very bloody so it doesn't have the lovely pink colour I was hoping for. It does have that lovely taste, however. I would love to see what it would look like with some of the incredible ruby blood oranges that seem to be popping up on various blogs.

I'm sure you could use another chocolate to top the cake - I just love the Green and Black's Maya Gold. Any good dark chocolate would work, but the delicate orange and spice flavour in the Maya Gold sets the cake off beautifully. I watched Chocolat last night and it seemed perfect to be using Maya Gold today! That film is pure chocolate porn - totally fabulous. My mum and I now skip through the bits with the nasty Count and just watch the chocolate and Johnny Depp - much more interesting!

My Version of Nigella's Clementine Cake

(Adapted from Nigella's recipe in Green and Black's recipe book, Unwrapped)

For the cake:

2 blood oranges (or 4-5 clementines, 2 normal oranges etc) weighing about 325g

1 additional blood orange, peeled

6 eggs

125g caster sugar

100g soft brown sugar

250g ground almonds (I used half/half skin on/blanched)

1 heaped tsp baking powder

Put the oranges into a saucepan whole and cover with water. Pop a lid on and heat for two hours - it should just boiling. Remove the oranges and let them cool a little before halving and removing any pips. Put into a food processor with the additional peeled orange and blend to a smooth pulp. 

Preheat the oven to 190C. Butter and fully line a 20cm tin. Beat all the eggs together in a big mixing bowl/standing mixer. Add the sugars, almonds and baking powder (you might need to use a sift to get any big lumps out and then replace the bigger almond bits). Mix well. Add the orange pulp and mix again. Transfer to a fully lined tin and put into the oven for 1 hr. You will probably need to cover it with foil to stop the top burning after 30-40 minutes. Leave to cool in the tin. 

To top:

50g Green and Blacks Maya Gold or another orange spiced chocolate - or just dark chocolate

Melt the chocolate and dribble over the cake. I like to eat a slice while it's still melted... The cake is best left till the next day before eating.

Dark Chocolate and Blood Orange Cupcakes

I got back to Oxford on Tuesday, so am now dislocated from my kitchen. It's beautiful weather here, and Oxford looks beautiful in it (it always does, but sunshine transforms the sandstone) - though it's now thronging with tourists but I don't blame them, it's gorgeous. Unfortunately I didn't take any photos when it was really stunning. Luckily my college isn't one of the big big ones, like Christ Church, that has tourists coming round and prying into every nook and cranny of our lives - though I do have friends who have people peering into their bedrooms and even coming in sometimes! I know we live in a beautiful place, but it's a working place our privacy is important too... though I would deal with that if I could have a kitchen! At least this is my last term - last eight weeks - before we get a kitchen in our flats.

Luckily I have a few recipes/photos leftover from the holidays, so I will be able to post them. It's interesting seeing how I feel my photography has come on just in the time since I've started writing this blog - practice does at least go towards making perfect, it seems. I may also do some with just ideas/photos/musing on what I've been eating - and with the quality of my hall food, I eat out a lot...

I made these cupcakes at the beginning of the holiday when mum had bought a bumper amount of blood oranges - mum always squeezes oranges on the magimix before breakfast, and loves to add some blood oranges or grapefruit to add a little interest - though there's nothing better than a batch of really good sweet oranges. I swear it's given me funny blood sugar patterns though - from an early age I had that big sugar rush of about 3 squeezed oranges within half an hour of waking up and now I feel quite ill if I don't have it/something else soon after getting up!

Anyway, I decided to see what happened if I made a chocolate orange style cupcake with them. I didn't really use a recipe - just played about and they came out really nicely. I don't really like lots of icing on cupcakes - sacrilege I know - so it's a nice compromise to add a square of nice chocolate to add another texture to an otherwise plain cupcake, even if it is full of flavour. I could deal with a chocolate ganache on these, actually - it's mainly the pure sugar buttercream like ones I can't deal with.

Blood Orange and Dark Chocolate Cupcakes

Edit: I've removed the recipe as I'm not happy with it and don't want you to try it and be disappointed.