Recipes

Blintzes

Blintzes are among the best-known dairy dishes, and deservedly so. Crispy and golden on the outside and warm and creamy inside, a great blintz offers deliciously contrasting textures and flavors. Blintzes aren't really pancakes, but because they're made from crepes, we're including them.

If you've mastered crepe making, you're ready to try blintzes, which are nothing more than crepes that have been cooked on one side only, then wrapped around a simple sweet or savory filling, with the cooked side facing in. You can prepare the crepes well in advance, roll the blintzes a few hours before you plan to serve them, and then brown them at the last minute.

Farmer cheese or pot cheese (drier versions of cottage cheese) are ideal for a blintz filling, though they can be hard to find. Conventional large-curd cottage cheese can also be used, but it should be drained for an hour or more in the refrigerator in a fine-mesh strainer set over a bowl. This helps the filling hold together better, and produces blintzes with a delicately firm texture. If you don't have time to drain cottage cheese, you can replace some of it with ricotta cheese.

At the Diner, we serve blintzes with sour cream and fruit preserves (berry or cherry are best) on the side. They're also wonderful with warm Blueberry Compote Topping.

1 recipe (16) Bette's diner crepes, prepared according to the Bette's Diner Crepes recipe but cooked on one side only.

Excerpted from The Pancake Handbook, Ten Speed Press, 1993, 1994 by Stephen Siegelman, Sue Conley and Bette Kroening.

16 blintzes; Serves 4