Yvoire, Almond Crepes & Bonding

Yvoire is the kind of place you want to visit with a good friend. You’ll navigate through the charmingly uneven cobblestoned and perfectly paved streets of this medieval village, stop for a double scoop of ice cream at 10:00 a.m, discuss the best location of the tables at your hypothetical wedding reception to ensure maximum sea view, and in lieu of making lunch reservations, you’ll spent about 40 minutes wandering from full restaurant to full restaurant, looking increasingly pathetic and hoping that some kindly restaurateur will let you spend your money there. You’ll eventually walk confidently into a restaurant and sit like you’re supposed to be there, order a bottle of wine and proceed to while away the hours bonding over every topic under the sun.

Yvoire is the quintessential French village – it overlooks the crystal blue sea and stone buildings make you want to bust into a rendition of any song from Beauty and the Beast. I may or may not have looked for Gaston (he’s roughly the size of a barge). It also helps that Yvoire has been classified as one of the most beautiful villages in France. I think that it would be lovely to live in a postcard town like this. I’d manage a small café and spend my days meeting new people, pouring copious amounts of coffee, inhaling chestnut paste smeared on freshly baked croissants, stumbling upon chateaus and finding nooks where I could read Sartre, Zola and Hugo. I’m also fluent in French in this fantasy and clearly kind of a douche.

But then reality steps in and I realize that I sometimes dislike talking to people, chestnut paste is nice but not food marriage material, and I‘m really not that into classic literature. Plus I don’t speak French. Ah well. I still know all the lyrics (and ok – lines as well) from Beauty and the Beast. Another unfortunate reality? Yvoire’s famous dish, Lake Perch & French Fries, isn’t that great. A little too saltless for this salt loving gal.

Visiting the Garden of the 5 Senses was a memorable experience although I’ll admit – I got a little mad. The concept of the Garden is that the type of the plants encourage you to use all 5 senses to truly enjoy the experience – but isn’t that the purpose of all gardens? Clever marketing, but when you think about it, any place can do that. Are you reading this, Guyana Tourism Authority?

What sense do I tickle next?

I’ve always turned down the opportunity to eat a crepe for some reason. It happened again in Yvoire (see aforementioned ice cream break above), but I decided to give crepes their due this time. I chose a simple recipe from Alton Brown, but added Almond extract because almonds in every form are the fricking bomb.

I’ve never been good at making perfectly shaped pancakes, and I realized too late that the pan that I was using was a little too large to get that lovely round shape. My first few crepes ended up looking like a pokemon, and it got so addictive that eventually I embraced it and tried to catch ’em all.

Pikachu? Jigglypuff?

Almond Crepes

• Servings: 3-4
• Difficulty: easy
• Print

Ingredients

2 Eggs
3/4 cup Milk
1/2 cup Water
1 cup Flour
1 tsp Almond Extract
3 tablespoons Butter, melted
Butter, for coating the pan

Toppings:
Bananas
Toasted Slivered Almonds
Nutella
Powdered Sugar

Instructions

Pulse all ingredients in a blender until smooth, about 10-15 seconds. Place in fridge for at least an hour (this is supposed to minimized tearing of crepes during cooking). Heat a small pan on medium heat and coat pan with butter. Pour 1/8 cup of batter into pan and swirl around to distribute evenly. Let cook for about 30 seconds, then flip and cook for another 10-15 seconds.

Remove from heat, add desired toppings and enjoy!

NB: According to Alton Brown, you can keep the batter in your fridge for up to 48 hours. Pretty cool for a Saturday or Sunday morning quick and fancy breakfast!

Linking up with Angie and the gals at Fiesta Friday this week, as well as Michelle over at A Dish of Daily Life.

See you back here next week for my last travel post! Who knows, I might even post it this week! i’m crazy like that 🙂