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Pancakes a la Creme
Rub the rind of half a small fresh lemon with 3 or 4 large lumps of sugar until the yellow part is all taken off, then crush the sugar to powder, and mix with it a pinch of powdered cinnamon, a small pinch of salt and an ounce of dried flour. Make this into a smooth paste with a little cold milk and an ounce of clarified butter; then stir in very gradually half a pint of thick cream and the well-whisked yolks of 4 and the whites of 2 eggs. Melt a quarter of an ounce of butter in a small frying-pan, fry the pancakes very quickly, and serve them as hot as possible. They should be very thin; a second supply of butter will not be required for frying. Time, three or four minutes to fry each pancake. Sufficient for four or five persons.
This is a rich, cream-based crepe batter rather than a raised griddle cake, and it behaves accordingly: very thin, very quick, and best eaten straight from the pan.
- The lemon sugar is the pointRubbing lump sugar over the zest until the yellow is gone draws the peel oils into the sugar. Granulated sugar in a bowl with the zest rubbed in by hand does the same job; bottled lemon extract does not, and the dish loses most of its character without it.
- Weights in modern termsAn ounce of flour is about 1/4 cup (28 g); an ounce of clarified butter is 2 tablespoons; a quarter ounce for the pan is about 1 1/2 teaspoons. Three or four large lumps of sugar is roughly 2 tablespoons.
- Half a pint of creamIf the book follows American measure that is 1 cup; British half-pints of the period run to 10 fl oz. Either works, but the smaller quantity gives a thicker batter, so add the cream gradually and stop when it pours like thin paint.
- Dried flourFlour was often warmed near the fire to drive off damp before being mixed into delicate batters. Modern packaged flour needs no such treatment; measure and use it as it is.
- Egg proportionFour yolks to two whites is unusual enough to look deliberate. The extra yolks add tenderness and colour, and the reduced quantity of white keeps the batter richer and less inclined to set firm. Better not to substitute whole eggs.
- Mix in order and restMix in order -- Making a smooth paste with a little milk and the butter before the cream goes in is what prevents lumps. The recipe gives no resting time, though a short rest to let the flour hydrate does no harm.
- Frying timeThree or four minutes is generous for a crepe this thin in a hot pan; expect closer to a minute on the first side and thirty to forty seconds on the second. Judge by the edges lifting and browning rather than by the clock.
- Butter in the panThe instruction that no second buttering is needed holds only if the batter's own clarified butter is well distributed and the pan is properly seasoned or non-stick. A light wipe between pancakes does no harm.
- ServingThe recipe gives four or five portions but no count of pancakes. Serve with lemon and the same flavoured sugar, or a spoonful of preserve; they collapse and toughen if held warm for long.
Rubbing sugar against citrus peel to capture the oils is a long-established trick in the European kitchen, the same principle behind the oleo-saccharum of punch-making, and it survived in Victorian and Edwardian cookery books because the flavour it gives is unreachable by juice alone. Pancakes of this type -- cream instead of milk, extra yolks, no raising agent, fried paper-thin -- sit close to the French crepe, and the tag a la creme reads as marking a richer version of the plain everyday pancake.