Dessert Crepes

This flourless dessert crepe recipe is a great way to have a restaurant-quality dessert at home without ignoring your dietary restrictions. And your options for fillings are endless.

I made these crepes last week for a DIY Crepe Station--the perfect ending to a lovely meal. Filling options included sliced strawberries (no sugar added), sliced bananas, whipped cream, vanilla and chocolate mousses, sugar-free vanilla yogurt, sugar-free chocolate syrup, honey and agave nectar. These offered everyone an opportunity to make their own creation. Who doesn't love that?

While it's a simple batter to mix up, making these crepes are a little fiddly--here are a few lessons learned:

• re-grease the pan before each crepe
• low heat is the way to go... be patient
• if the crepe is troublesome to flip, give it another minute
• you can repair cracks by adding a wee patch of extra batter

On to the recipe.

Flourless Dessert Crepes

makes about 5 five-inch crepes

Canola Spray

2 large eggs at room temperature

2 tablespoons heavy cream

2 tablespoons agave nectar (or honey, or sugar, or sugar replacer of choice; for savory crepes, omit sweetener altogether)

2 teaspoons flavorless vegetable oil

1/4 teaspoon pure vanilla extract (omit for savory crepes)

In a medium bowl, whisk together eggs, cream, agave nectar, oil and vanilla.

Set a small saute pan (I used an 8-inch nonstick pan with a 5-inch bottom) over medium-low heat; when preheated, spray with canola spray.

Ladle just enough batter into pan to coat the bottom. You may need to turn the pan to distribute batter. Let sit for about 2 minutes.

I checked the batter by touching it carefully; when liquid did not stick to my finger, I flipped it. When it looks puffy, it's ready to flip.

To flip, carefully slide crepe to one side and flip using a silicon spatula. Again, this takes some doing. I wrecked my share, believe me. Here's one that didn't turn out so well.

That one was for my mouth.

After flipping, they only need another minute to finish cooking. I stacked them on a plate with wax paper between each crepe, and that worked wonderfully.

Here's a good one. Fortunately most of my crepes came out this way.

But some didn't. Some were a little overdone--they just looked a little darker than they should. Perfectly edible. Others were torn, or a little squished. All edible, but not perfect. These went to the bottom of the stack.

I could have only showed you the good ones, but I wanted to be honest here: I am not a perfect crepe-maker. But imperfection is good, too.