Three square meals plus dessert at Crêpes ’n’ Crêpes
Kids get pretty excited when breakfast gets mixed up with other meals. Who doesn’t remember the youthful thrill of breakfast for dinner? Fluffy pancakes and crisp bacon after sundown? So wild. Scrambled eggs by candlelight? Outrageous. Children are easily impressed, and sometimes so are grown-ups, especially at desserts that can double as lunch and dinner.
Crêpes are usually considered a sweet snack—the thin, light-as-air pancakes are often wrapped around fruit and whipped cream—but they can also be all-purpose containers for savory meats and cheeses. The crêpe’s origins are in the Brittany region of northwest France, and just like most French food, the key ingredients are butter, eggs, milk, and more butter. Wheat flour is typically used for dessert crêpes; buckwheat flour for the non-sweet varieties.
Denver crêperie Crêpes ’n’ Crêpes (1512 Larimer St., 303-534-1620 and 2816 E. Third Ave., 303-320-4184) offers both styles on its menu. Here crêpes come in handy for every eating occasion, from breakfast to dessert. The Cherry Creek location is a popular brunch destination with crêpe-crazed hordes sipping champagne and browsing the long list of fillings nearly every weekend.
At lunch on a weekday, the small, warm café is far more sedate. There still might be a shortage of tables, but the bar usually has plenty of seats and it also offers a lovely, fragrant view of the crêpe-making process. Standard lunch profiles are offered, like turkey or ham and cheese, and those are fine, but the richer, heavier (and thus deliciously more French) flavors are the way to go.
If it’s going to be a slow afternoon at work, try the food coma-inducing poulet au gratin crêpe. The crêpe, grilled golden brown and piping hot, is stuffed with chunks of chicken breast, wild mushrooms, and melted Emmenthaler cheese, all swimming in white-wine cream sauce, which stays cozy inside the crêpe until it’s cut open. It’s a warm little pocket of Gallic delights, and so hearty that a sweet crêpe is almost impossible afterward. What’s the big deal with dessert anyway?
