Winemaker, Jeff Murphy, loves maple syrup and made an aperitif using estate-grown grape spirits, Vidal wine, and local syrup. The Maple Liqueur tastes like a combination of ice wine and sherry, with a hint of maple. Johnson Estate released this new liqueur in March 2015, just as the region’s tapping season began. To celebrate NYS Maple Weekends, Fred was inspired to suggest serving this beverage with crêpes, which Fanny Tauzin-Dauga, a 2014 French winery intern, made for us during her stay here. Her recipe uses 2 cups of milk and she omits the butter, but liberally greases the pan with it. When I could not find her recipe, I used Julia Child’s recipe for dessert crêpes – except for the substitution of Maple Liqueur instead of the brandy/rum/orange liqueur. Remember that the batter benefits from resting at least two hours or overnight, according to Julia, before you make the crêpes.
Ingredients
- 1 cup whole milk
- 1 cup water
- 2 whole eggs
- 2 egg yolks
- 1 tbsp sugar
- 3 tbsps Johnson Estate Maple Liqueur
- 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 5 tbsps clarified, melted butter
- maple syrup, ground toasted nuts, and other garnishes
Directions
- Pour the milk, water, eggs, sugar, and Maple Liqueur into a food processor and blend for about a minute.
- In a separate bowl, mix flour, sifted if you like, and salt. Then add the liquid ingredients and mix well with an egg whip. Add the melted butter and stir until the batter is smooth – it will be quite thin.
- To begin cooking the crêpes, first make a test crêpe. Coat the skillet with a little butter and make sure the skillet is hot before pouring in a small ladle of batter. Immediately tilt the pan in all directions to coat the bottom of the skillet – if there is excess batter, pour it back into the bowl – and then put the pan on the heat for about a minute.
- Loosen the crêpe by sharply jerking the pan back and forth; lift the edge with a spatula and when lightly brown, flip it over to brown lightly. Julia notes that the second side is usually “spotty brown” and kept as the “nonpublic” aspect of the crepe. If the test crêpe is too thick, add water to thin the batter. Adjust the quantity of batter poured into the pan so that there is just one thin layer and no excess.
- Remove the crêpe and then brush a small amount of maple syrup on the crêpe. Sprinkle ground nuts – toasted pecans, Chocolate Hazelnuts, or Cinnamon Walnuts and roll it into one cylinder. Cut in half, if you like, and keep warm before serving. Fanny would make a large plate of crêpes and each guest would add spread butter, jam, syrup, sugar, etc to taste.
