What is it?
Mille Crêpes is a modern take on a classic French pastry - the crêpe! Also known as Crepe Cake in English and 日式千层蛋糕 in Japanese, it is basically a stack of 10-30 crepes with a creme in between. Variations of this cake have been seen with various fruits and candies between the layers as well as with different flavors of both cream and crêpe! There are even savory crêpes where people have placed vegetables, meats and even ratatouille! It is a VERY popular cake in Asian countries with some shops even selling nothing else but various varieties of mille crêpes! In the past sixteen or so years, the shop Dotour has made this a staple dessert of decadence in Japan and now we can spread that to the US! Click here to see pictures of Mille Crêpe Cakes.
Where can I try it?
I looked everywhere for nearly two months and couldn't find it for sale anywhere in San Diego or even Las Vegas! I was able to find it available online at various shops for a very very high price and it was usually the center star of each shop's repertoire. It seems to cost around $80 per cake and even more for the creative styles.
Lady M Confections (New York, NY) - The most famous crêpes cake in the US
Mackenzie Lmtd (online/catalog order only) - different flavors, any locale
These scans and translations are by Cookie Dough.
How do I make it? (according to the official cookbook)
Ingredients:
- 2/3 preparation of Custard Creme
- 2/3 preparation of Whipped Creme
- 8oz / 0.5lb all purpose flour (sifted)
- 10g granulated sugar
- 3 eggs
- 2 cups milk
- 1oz butter (melted)
- 1g salt
- a touch of vanilla essence
Directions:
1. Sift the flower and then mix it with the granulated sugar and salt in a bowl.
2. Place the milk and eggs in to another bowl and mix while slowly adding the mixture from step 1.
3. Mix the melted butter and vanilla essence in and then strain the mixture to rid of any lumps.
4. Spread a little butter on to an ~8in frying pan. Ladle a small round circle of batter on to the pan while tilting it around in order to spread the batter evenly. Cook over a low to medium heat until the surface is dry then flip and cook it on the other side. It cooks quickly, so don't burn it. Allow all of the crêpes to cool.
5. Mix the custard creme and whipped cream together until it has a smooth melt-in-your-mouth texture.
6. To build the cake, start with a crêpe, spread a very thin layer of creme over the crepe and repeat until you've achieved the cake tower!
Storage:
If refrigerated for at least an hour, it will be easier to cut.
How do I make it better? (recipe is: Ivonne following NY Times imitating Lady M)
Ingredients for Crêpe Batter:
- 6 tbsp butter (either melted or as a burre noissete)
- 3 cups milk
- 6 eggs
- 1.5 cups all-purpose flour
- 7 tbsp sugar
- pinch of salt
- vegetable oil
Crêpe Directions:
The day before serving the cake, make the crepe batter and the pastry cream. For the batter, cook the butter in a small pan until brown like hazelnuts. Set aside. In another small pan, heat the milk until steaming; allow to cool for 10 minutes. In a mixer on medium-low speed, beat together the eggs, flour, sugar and salt. Slowly add the hot milk and browned butter. Pour into a container with a spout, cover and refrigerate overnight.
To make the crepes, bring the batter to room temperature. Place a nonstick or seasoned 9-inch crepe pan over medium heat. Swab the surface with the oil, then add about 3 tablespoons batter and swirl to cover the surface. Cook until the bottom just begins to brown, about 1 minute, then carefully lift an edge and flip the crepe with your fingers. Cook on the other side for no longer than 5 seconds. Flip the crepe onto a baking sheet lined with parchment. Repeat until you have 20 perfect crepes.
Ingredients for Vanilla Pastry Creme:
- 2 cups milk
- 1 tbsp vanilla extract
- 6 egg yolks
- 0.5 cups sugar
- 1/3 cup cornstarch (sifted)
- 3.5 tbsp butter
Vanilla Pastry Creme Directions:
Bring the milk to a boil. Turn off the heat and stir in the vanilla extract then set aside for 10 minutes. Fill a large bowl with ice and set aside a small bowl that can hold the finished pastry cream and be placed in this ice bath.
In a medium heavy-bottomed pan, whisk together the egg yolks, sugar and cornstarch. Gradually whisk in the hot milk, then place pan over high heat and bring to a boil, whisking vigorously for 1 to 2 minutes. Press the pastry cream through a fine-meshed sieve into the small bowl. Set the bowl in the ice bath and stir until the temperature reaches 140 degrees on an instant-read thermometer. Stir in the butter. When completely cool, cover and refrigerate.
Ingredients for Cake Assembly:
- 2 cups heavy cream
- 1 tbsp sugar
- 3 tbsp Kirsch
- icing sugar (optional)
Cake Assembly Directions:
Whip the heavy cream with the tablespoon sugar and the Kirsch. It won’t hold stiff peaks but that’s okay. Fold it into the pastry cream.
Lay 1 crepe on a cake plate. Using an icing spatula, completely cover with a thin layer of pastry cream (about 1/4 cup). Cover with a crepe and repeat to make a stack of 20, with the best-looking crepe on top. Chill for at least 2 hours. Set out for 30 minutes before serving. If you have a blowtorch for creme brulee, sprinkle the top crepe with 2 tablespoons sugar and caramelize with the torch; otherwise, dust with confectioners’ sugar. Slice like a cake.
Hints and tips from the show:
- Let the butter melt naturally and roll the pan to spread it.
- You have to make crêpes naturally and calmly.
- Spread around the batter quickly after pouring to avoid holes.
- The secret to their taste is to make them super thin.
- Lower the temperature of the pan after each crêpe is done.
- Don't hesitate or be afraid to flip them.
Hints and tips from the real world:
- It takes a lot of time to put this cake together, plan out at least two days to prepare this!
- The best way to cut it is straight down without any kind of sawing motion. Sharp knife!
- If you want, you can use wax paper between the crepes while you're making/storing them.
- The thinner and flatter the crepes are, the easier the cream to spread and the cake to build.
- Don't overcook the pastry cream.
- If the pan's heat is too high, you'll get holes from bubbles in your crepes.
- If the pan's heat is too high, you'll get holes from bubbles in your crepes.
- Serve the final product with some kind of fruit or fruit sauce. You can push berries through a sieve to remove seeds, add some similar juice and then add sugar for viscosity.
- Don't sacrifice quality for cheaper/more available ingredients... basically, use heavy cream and don't be tempted to replace it with whipping or other creams... the result is runny and hard to construct.
- Many people substitute Gran Marnier for Kirsch and visa versa, experiment for yourself.
- It takes practice, but try to make the crepes all the same size.
- You can store crepes 30 min in the oven on the lowest setting, 1 week in the fridge if you put them in a ziplock bag with wax paper between each crepe or up to a month in the freezer if you put them in a ziplock bag with wax paper between each crepe.
- If you let the butter that you lube the pan with brown for a bit, you'll get a nutty taste.
- Let the batter rest for an hour to overnight for best texture.
- You don't need a crepe pan, just a good teflon pan!
- You can store crepes 30 min in the oven on the lowest setting, 1 week in the fridge if you put them in a ziplock bag with wax paper between each crepe or up to a month in the freezer if you put them in a ziplock bag with wax paper between each crepe.
- If you let the butter that you lube the pan with brown for a bit, you'll get a nutty taste.
- Let the batter rest for an hour to overnight for best texture.
- You don't need a crepe pan, just a good teflon pan!
Ideas for variations:
- The top crêpe has been seen to be used as a decoration by a few that I found. Some suggest making it extra large just to cover the edges of the other crepes while one even cut it in to slices and used it to decorate it by layering one slice over the other.
- Many of the shops I found seem to experiment with various crepe thickness and color while the finer ones all seemed to have variations emphasizing the thinness of each individual crepe.
- The crepe itself can be flavored with quite a few shops choosing chocolate crepes and a couple even doing green tea flavoring for their crepes which gave an interesting color.
- Thinly sliced fruit can be placed between each crepe with some shops choosing different fruits for every few layers! I will definitely be experimenting with this!
- Many people brulee the top crepe which works great if you don't mind the risk and have a torch handy.
- If you have a press-toaster, you can "iron" each crepe to give it a very different texture.
- Using tbsp of sugar per an egg, you can use whites to make a merang instead of the whipping cream.
References:
The anime crepe looks better than the real one, and the instructions are easy to follow!
ReplyDeleteThe one for the anime is a simplified recipe meant for children. Keep that in mind since after you try it, you may want a more refined mille crepe. The recipe provided here is actually from a world famous bakery for it's Mile Crepe - Lady M Confectionary.
ReplyDeleteif you ate only half the cake, and wanted to save it for tomorrow, how would you go about storing the rest of the cake so that it doesn't go bad/stale or anything overnight??
ReplyDeleteHi anonymous! My family and I took a full week to eat our cake because as we ate it, we made our slices progressively thinner. It kept all right in the fridge with saran plastic wrap around it and it still tasted good. I guess the important part would be to not leave the cake out for too long since there is a lot of cream in there that can spoil quickly in warm weather.
ReplyDeletewhen i made mine, the crepes came out kind of.. hard. how do i make it so that they're light and fluffy? ..and edible? xD
ReplyDeleteHi anonymous,
ReplyDeleteI'm not a professional baker or anything... so honestly, I'm not quite sure what went wrong here. I'm in the middle of making a mille crepe as we speak where I plan on putting really thin strawberry slices between the layers. The first one I made came out alright and the batter looked good. Was your batter too thin or too thick? I intentionally made my batter this time thinner... we'll see in a few hours how it came out. It's setting in the fridge.
what happen if i use lady m's recipe but i didnt fold in the whiped heavy cream,sugar n kirsch? Would it still taste good?
ReplyDeletehi,
ReplyDeletecan i only use custard creme instead of mixing it with whipped creme?
really Wanted to eat mille crepe but we dont have it here in the philippines.......
ReplyDelete-Janelle-
Is it nessecary to have the cake assembly ingredients and ''fold'' it into the pastry cream? Is it possible to just use the pastry cream?
ReplyDeleteWonderful recipe! *applauses*
ReplyDeleteI have tried many other recipes but this is THE best! Good Job!
^o^
I like a savory crepe because I'm a vegetarian. I eat with spinach or mustard and I eat it at least three times a week. Besides, I usually make crepes for celebrating my birthday or to make another event.
ReplyDelete