I love crêpes. I guess it’s one of my favorite pastries and one of my favorite french treat. I love the smooth and thin layer of dough, I love the smell of the ingredients mixing together to bring a unique taste and perfume each time. Crêpes never really taste the same. They always taste something special, something typical of the day you choose to cook them. 

When I was younger, it was always a feast when my Mom was baking crêpes. During the whole winter, I’m sure we had some every week at least, always with a different taste. She always put so much love in them and I guess that’s what made them so special. Each family has a different recipe of crêpes I should say. Some like them a bit thick and other love them thin. Some enjoy a light taste of rhum in the back whereas some like the flavour of orange blossom better. 

When I was at school, every mother would bake some for the year feast and I remember that it was an occasion for us to seize each other. It was all about whose mother made the best crêpes in the school and most time, no one could admit that someone else’s crêpes were better than their mother’s!

Back in 2013, I wanted to get my own crêpes recipe, that is to say, a gluten free recipe and a recipe that would taste like the weather outside : spicy and comforting. Crêpes are usually a very basic dish : wheat flour, eggs and milk. With such basic ingredients, it’s always possible to give way to your imagination and go ahead with tons of different recipes. Since I have a weakness for chocolate, I wanted to come out with a chocolate gluten free crêpe recipe. Moreover, we had a red kuri squash in the fridge which we wanted to do something unusual with. So I came up with a chestnut squash jam recipe which was perfect with my gluten free chocolate crêpes. 

I’ll leave you with the recipe without any further ado…

Chesnut squash jam :

Gluten free chocolate crêpes :

The day before :

Cut the chestnut squash into half and take the seeds appart.

Cook it in boiling water until it’s very smooth (about 25 minutes).

Use a spoon to get the pulp appart in a bowl and throw the skin away.

Peel the apples and cut them in quarters. Cook them for 25 minutes in boiling water with cinnamon or any other spice. 

Put the chestnut squash pulp and the cooked apple in a pot. You can add some spices if you wish too. Pumpkin spices for exemple, will taste great. Add the sugar and the fruit juices and leave the mixing overnight.

The d-day :

Cook the chestnut squash jam for half an hour and put it in glass jars.

In a large bowl, whisk together the chocolate, the cream, the eggs, the sugar and the rhum. Add the flours and little by little, the milk. Keep whisking until the dough is homogeneous. Set the dough in the fridge to rest for 1 hour or more. 

When ready to use, stir the dough again. Heat a frying pan and spread a little bit of oil.  When it’s hot, add a thin layer of crêpe dough in the center of the frying pan and move to coat the bottom. Cook it for approximately one minute (until it starts bubbling). Flip it and cook it for another minute. Repeat this step until you run out of dough and keep the crêpes on a plate as you work.

Serve with a spoon of chestnut squash jam and a cup of hot christmas tea or hot chocolate.