A week ago I
spent four days in New York City for a romance writers’ conference. I know—I
write mysteries, but I started out trying to write romance, and now I’ve come
back to it with a self-published paranormal romance series. I figured it was
time to see what the opposition, er, our colleagues were up to now.
I won’t bore
you with the details of a very large, very busy and very interesting
convention. And I’ll admit up front, I wanted to go in part because it was held
in New York, on Times Square. It’s a city with more restaurants than you could
eat at in your life, assuming you ate out three meals a day. Or maybe four. You
have Thai restaurants next to French bistros next to Cuban nightclubs next to
Irish pubs. Yes, I found an Irish pub named Connolly’s and had dinner there,
and a couple of pints.
But even the
hotel food surpasses 97% of what I can get in my neighborhood. My last (sob)
meal in the city, in the conference hotel, was breakfast at the hotel buffet,
where I ate my first blintz. And then I went back for seconds. How was it I had
never met these cuties before? They’re a bit time-consuming to assemble, but
the ingredients are simple. Mostly they’re a thin crepe wrapped around a
flavored ricotta filling, then sautéed in butter. The crepes and the filling
can be made ahead, if you want to wow your guests at breakfast. (What, you
never have guests at breakfast? Go ahead and eat them all yourself.)
Cheese Blintzes
Crepes
1 cup milk
1/4 cup cold
water
2 eggs
1 cup
all-purpose flour
Pinch salt
1 Tblsp sugar
3 Tblsp
unsalted butter, melted
More butter
for sautéeing the crepes
Combine the
milk, water, eggs, flour, salt and sugar in a food processor. Blend on medium
speed for about 15 seconds, until the batter is smooth and there are no lumps.
Scrape down the sides and pour in the melted butter. Blend again to mix.
Refrigerate
the batter for an hour to let it rest.
Place a
non-stick skillet over medium heat and brush with a little melted butter. Pour
1/4 cup of the batter into the pan and swirl to cover the bottom evenly. Cook for 30-45 seconds, until the batter
sets. Loosen the crepe from the pan, then flip and cook the other side for 30
seconds. (They will not be crisp—you want to be able to fold them.)
Slide the
crepe onto a platter. Cover each one with a paper towel to keep them from
drying out or sticking to each other. Repeat until all the batter is used up
(this recipe made nine—if I’d made them a bit smaller I could have had a couple
more).
Filling
1-1/2 cups
ricotta cheese
4 oz cream
cheese
3 Tblsp
confectioner’s sugar
Zest of 1
lemon, finely grated
1 egg
In a food
processor, combine the cheeses, the sugar, the lemon zest and the egg and blend
until smooth. Chill to firm up a bit so it won’t squish out when you make the
blintzes.
Forming the Blintzes
Lay a crepe
in front of you and spoon 1/4 cup of the filling along the bottom third. Fold
that edge away from you to just cover the filling. Fold the two sides in toward
the center, then fold the top side down. Roll it around to make a package,
ending with the seam side down.
 |
| Halfway there |
In an
oven-proof skillet over medium heat, brush on melted butter, and pan-fry the
blintzes for 2 minutes per side, until they’re crisp and golden.
When they’re
all sautéed, place the pan in a 400-degree preheated oven and bake for 10
minutes, to cook the filling through. Transfer to serving plates.
 |
| There are only eight here because one collapsed in the making. I ate it. |
You can serve
these as is, or you can add a fruit sauce or fresh fruit of your choice
(blueberries or a mix of blueberries and raspberries works well). I went with a
lightly-cooked blueberry compote.
Yes, dear readers, I write romance--a paranormal romance series (available in multiple e-formats). The only mystery in them is why my heroine starts seeing her dead ancestors. Luckily her boyfriend does too. BTW, I borrow a lot of my Massachusetts ancestors for this series, but I haven't met any of them face to face. Yet.
