Brunch with a flip: Crepes a la Florentine

For three months, I served crepes and wine at a cafe near my college apartment. I'd never even tasted a crepe when the retired-engineer-turned-restauranteur hired me, but the recipes were works-in-progress, so I ate crepes all summer: with asparagus and hollandaise, banana and nutella, flaming crepes suzette.

In the six years since, I never made them at home -- until today. With a recipe and a little inspiration from a recent class at Blue Ribbon Cooking, I prepared my mise en place forGateau de Crepes a la Florentine (roughly translated: giant saucy pan of crepes with spinach).

Despite initial fear, I've pretty much mastered the French flipping of a crepe: paper-thin disks fly from my frying pan, crisp at the edges, perfectly browned on one side. I flipped about 30 crepes today, and not one landed outside the pan. Yes, quite impressive, thanks.

Note: this is a long recipe with many steps, but it's not super tricky and can be assembled in advance then heated half an hour before serving.

Gateau de Crepes a la Florentine

Ingredients:

• Batter for 24 crepes (must be made at least 2 hours in advance)

For the sauce mornay (bechamel with cheese):

• 5 T flour
• 4 T butter
• 2¾ cups boiling milk
• 1/2 tsp salt1/4 tsp pepper
• Nutmeg, whole for grating
• ¼ C heavy cream
• 1 C coarsely grated cheese -- should be swiss, but I used an aged white cheddar

For the spinach filling (this is double the suggested amount of spinach, which seemed like barely a garnish in the dish):

• 3 C wilted, chopped spinach (just wilt it in a medium-hot pan, no oil necessary)
• 2-4 T of the mornay sauce above
• Salt + pepper

For cheese and mushroom filling:

• 1 C cream cheese
• Salt and pepper
• 1 egg
• 1 C chopped mushrooms
• 1 T minced green onion
• 1 T butter

For finishing:

• 2 T grated cheese
• 1 T butter

Make the sauce mornay:

Melt butter, then add flour and whisk two minutes. Remove from heat, and beat in the hot milk, salt, pepper, and nutmeg. Boil, stirring, until slightly thick. Reduce heat and slowly stir in cream, then cheese. Remove from heat.

The spinach:
Mix wilted spinach with 2-4 T of the sauce mornay. Salt and pepper to taste.

The cheese and mushroom filling:
Saute mushrooms and green onions in butter. Beat cream cheese and egg in a bowl, then stir in mushrooms. Season.

Assemble:

Either make all your crepes in advance, or make them as you assemble the dish.

Line a lightly-buttered baking dish with crepes, overlapping just a bit and tearing them in half if they don't fit properly whole (no one will see what they look like, so just make it work). Then layer: first, a thin layer of spinach, then a thin layer of mushroom filling, then spread sauce mornay over it. Continue, with a layer of crepes, then spinach, then mushroom, then mornay. Finish with a layer of crepes, and cover with remaining sauce mornay. Sprinkle with remaining cheese, and dot with butter. Refrigerate until a half-hour before serving, or proceed directly with baking.

Bake:

Preheat oven to 375. Bake dish 25 to 30 minutes in upper third of oven. To serve, cut in pie-shaped wedges.