Scottish Cullen Skink Crepes

Celebrate Shrove Tuesday with a Scottish twist. Taking all the flavours of a traditional Cullen Skink soup - Smoked Haddock, Potatoes, Leeks and Milk - and using them as a savoury pancake day filling. Say Bonjour to Crepes with a Scottish accent. Much to good to save only for Pancake Day!

For the uninitiated, Cullen Skink possibly doesn't sound the most enticing of foods but I can assure you that it is. Hailing from Cullen, a small fishing village on the North East coast of Scotland, it's a hearty soup made of milk, smoked fish, potatoes and leeks. If you fancy giving it a go head to my recipe for Cullen Skink - A traditional Scottish Smoked Haddock Soup. I'm a huge fan of savoury crepes/pancakes so with pancake day beckoning and purchases of leeks and smoked haddock made at Stonehaven Farmer's Market I decided to combine them both in my Cullen Skink Crepes.

Cadbury Creme Egg Pancakes

You are either going to love these or hate these. Social media reaction to them ranged from "Far too sweet for me", "Yuk, no, just no!!!", "Why would you even do that!!!" to "OMG!!! Touched by Genius", "So weird, so good!", "I need these in my life" and one of my favourites, "I'd be scared to try these incase I really liked them". Cream Egg Bakes seem to have become a 'thing' in recent years and I've watched my fellow food bloggers create some real masterpieces incorporating them. Time for me to jump on the bandwagon. I actually wrote off my first attempt at Creme Egg Pancakes as a complete failure and lost cause as I thought they looked rather ugly. Social media said otherwise (most likes ever on on of my instagram photos) so I've tweaked the method a bit, made a second batch and here they are in all their glory.

When I shared them on Facebook I used the phrase "When Pancake Day and Easter collide you get Creme Egg Pancakes!" I'd just like to clarify that of course I meant metaphorically speaking. Those who berated the wording as being daft, ignorant and stupid can now get down off their soapboxes. I do know that they can never actually collide and the the 40 day period in between is indeed known as Lent. And before anyone comments that the recipe says to cook on a girdle as opposed to a griddle, in Scotland that really is the correct word. You can use a frying pan, griddle or girdle. Now I'll get down off my soapbox ;-)

GIRDLE, n. A met. form of Eng. griddle, a circular iron plate with hooped handle, suspended or placed over the fire and used for baking scones, oat-cakes, etc.

Cadbury Creme Egg Pancakes

3 Cadbury Creme Eggs

125g Self Raising Flour

1 Tsp Baking Powder

2 Tbsp Caster Sugar

1 Free Range Egg - beaten

aprox 100ml Milk

Oil or Butter to grease

Freeze the Creme Eggs for an hour then use a serrated knife to cut them into thin slices. (The ends of the eggs are the chef's perk!)

Places the slices on a sheet of greaseproof paper and return to the freezer whilst you make the pancake batter. 

Sieve together the dry ingredients and make a well. Add beaten egg and mix. Gradually add milk whisking well until you reach a dropping consistency. You may need slightly more or less depending on your flour and the size of your egg.

Preheat a girdle or frying pan on the hob and grease with butter or oil.

Spoon on the batter to the desired size and place a creme egg slice on top. 

Once the pancake starts to bubble turn over with a palette knife to cook the other side. 

Don't eat straight off the girdle as the creme egg will be like molten lava. Seriously HOT! 

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Nutella IN Pancakes

We get through a LOT of Nutella in the Foodie Quine house. Or rather my daughter does. She would eat it morning, noon and night given half the chance. If I could remember where I first spotted the idea of Nutella IN pancakes as opposed to ON pancakes I'd give due credit but I'm afraid I can't. It is however all over Pinterest in various shapes and forms. This is how we made our first ever batch. The idea is far from mine but this is our version.

My basic pancake recipe is my Grandmothers (she of the famous Grandma Monearn's Shortbread) hence the imperial measurements. I've never got around to converting it to metric. If it ain't broke don't fix it. We made this on holiday in Galloway where the accommodation we were staying had an Aga hence we cooked them straight on the hot plates. Before anyone comments that the recipe says to cook on a girdle as opposed to a griddle, in Scotland that really is the correct word. You can use a frying pan, girdle or griddle.

GIRDLE, n. A met. form of Scots. griddle, a circular iron plate with hooped handle, suspended or placed over the fire and used for baking scones, oat-cakes, etc.

Nutella IN Pancakes

Nutella

4oz Plain Flour

1 Tbsp Sugar

1 tsp Cream of Tartar

1/2 tsp Bicarb of Soda

Pinch of salt

1 beaten egg

Milk

Freeze teaspoonful sized discs of Nutella on a silicone sheet or baking parchment, we left them overnight to solidify.

To make the pancakes sieve together all the dry ingredients and make a well. Add beaten egg and mix. Gradually add milk whisking well until you reach a dropping consistency.

Preheat a buttered girdle or frying pan on the hob.

Spoon on the batter to the desired size and place on a Nutella disc. Top with more batter and cook as normal

Once the pancake starts to bubble turn over with a palette knife to cook the other side.

Put in between a folded tea towel on a cooling rack to keep warm.

Don't eat straight off the girdle as the filling is seriously HOT!

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Pancake Day - A Retrospective

So its been and gone and all over for another year but I still wanted to share what we did. Shrove Tuesday coincided with half term which meant that the kids were around all day so we indulged morning, noon and night. First up at breakfast were the Peppa Pig Muddy Puddle Pancakes from a packet mix which I will fully admit I was anticipating being awful. However they were rather successful and tasted pretty darn good with lashings of Nutella and banana. Boy still in his onesie gave flipping a go. Love his facial expressions. Girl was happy just to eat. The more chocolatey the better.

Savoury crepes for lunch with everyone getting their own choice of topping. I use Delia's recipe. Boy opted for cheese, paprika and chilli and girl tuna sweetcorn and cheese. I went for cheese, chive, tomato, paprika and chilli followed up with a traditional sugar and lemon. At the same time I cooked off eight more to use for dinner in the evening and stacked them up interleaved with greaseproof.

Friends came round in the afternoon and boy cooked up a batch of bannocks/scotch pancakes. He did a great job all on his own especially once he got the temperature of the griddle under control. The Great British Bake Off trick of hiding the burnt ones underneath was adopted for serving.

Boy requested Seafood Pancakes for dinner but by this time girl had had more than enough and could not believe that we were having them again. Perhaps you can get too much of a good thing. The premade crepes were filled with mixed fish and seafood in a white sauce and warmed through in the oven.

Twitter was full of pancake day references throughout the day and I tweeted some of my efforts @foodiequine including the montage below. Richard Stone aka @MrCookShop offered up a prize and guess what - we won! You can read all about it on the Mr Cook Shop Blog. 

This is where it gets tricky. The choice of prize was a Gingerbread Man Baking Set or a Victoria Eggs Apron. I do love the Victoria Eggs range and planning ahead bought a Christmas themed apron from it in the January sales. So without discussing with boy and girl I chose an apron. Big mistake. I then confessed that we had won a prize and of course they asked what and I immediately felt guilty so showed them the options and of course they overruled me with gingerbread.

Our prize arrived at the weekend and it is gorgeous. I absolutely adore the gingerbread bowl and have no further longings for yet another apron. It's not very clear in the picture but it's a traditional Mason & Cash bowl but with boy and girl gingerbreads round the side. Thanks again to Mr Cookshop for the prize but I'm definitely giving up pancakes for Lent.