Monte Cristo Crepes — The Foundation I Built Everything On

Two years. One hundred and four weeks of writing about food and life. If I'd known when I started that I'd be here — thirty weeks pregnant, sixty miles from where I began, and a thousand emotional miles from who I was — I would not have believed it. Two years ago this week, Raj and I got married. The anniversary fell on a Wednesday, which is the least romantic day of the week, but we celebrated anyway. Raj brought home takeout from our favorite Indian restaurant (because I'm too pregnant and too exhausted to cook a celebration meal, and he knows better than to try his chicken tikka masala again) and we ate on the couch and watched our wedding video. Our wedding video. I haven't watched it in months. There's Amma, young(er), vigorous, commanding the catering team with the authority of a woman who will not tolerate insufficient sambar. There's Appa, crying during the ceremony and pretending he wasn't. There's Arvind, looking uncomfortable in his veshti and stealing gulab jamun from the dessert table when he thought no one was looking. And there's Amma, again, in the reception video, dancing. Dancing. Amma, who claims she doesn't dance, who has told me her whole life that "Krishnamurthy women don't dance in public," is on the video dancing to a Tamil film song with Kamala Aunty, her sari pallu flying, her face split open with a joy I rarely see anymore. I paused the video on her face. That face. Unguarded, unworried, completely present. The face of a woman who hasn't started forgetting. I wrote about it in the journal. Page eighty-seven. "Amma dancing at my wedding, 2016. This is who she was." Two years of marriage. Two years of sambar and anxiety and loss and hope. Two years of Raj's pancakes and Amma's rasam and my own fumbling attempts to be good at everything at once. I'm not good at everything. I'm good at some things. I'm good at cooking. I'm good at catching drug interactions. I'm good at writing. I'm learning to be good at being married, and I'm about to learn to be good at being a mother. Anaya kicks. Ten weeks to go. I made dosa for our anniversary dinner. Dosa from scratch — the soaked rice, the wet grinder, the twelve-hour fermentation. The full production. Not because dosa is celebratory food but because dosa is foundational food, the base layer, the thing everything else is built on. Two years. One hundred and four weeks. One daughter on the way. One mother to preserve. One kitchen. Enough. For now, enough.

Dosa is a thing I make when I need to feel grounded — when I need to remember that I know how to do hard things slowly and well. The closest I can offer you from my recipe files, for the days when you want that same slow, intentional labor and that same thin, yielding result, is these Monte Cristo Crèpes: hand-made batter, a hot pan, and a filling that rewards the patience you brought to it. They’re not dosa — nothing is — but they ask the same thing of you: presence, attention, and the willingness to stand at the stove and let something take its time. On an anniversary that falls on a Wednesday, or any day that turns out to matter more than you expected, that’s enough.

Monte Cristo Crepes

Prep Time: 15 min | Cook Time: 25 min | Total Time: 40 min | Servings: 4

Ingredients

• For the crepes:
• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 2 large eggs
• 1 1/4 cups whole milk
• 2 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted, plus more for the pan
• 1/4 teaspoon fine salt
• For the filling:
• 6 oz thinly sliced deli ham
• 6 oz thinly sliced deli turkey
• 6 oz thinly sliced Swiss cheese
• 2 tablespoons Dijon mustard
• To serve:
• Powdered sugar, for dusting
• 1/2 cup raspberry preserves or jam, warmed

Instructions

1. Make the batter. Whisk together the flour, eggs, milk, melted butter, and salt in a medium bowl until completely smooth with no lumps. Let the batter rest at room temperature for 10 minutes — this relaxes the gluten and gives you a more tender crepe.
2. Cook the crepes. Heat a 10-inch nonstick skillet or crepe pan over medium heat. Brush lightly with melted butter. Pour in 1/4 cup of batter and immediately tilt and swirl the pan to spread the batter into a thin, even round. Cook for 1 to 2 minutes until the edges look set and the underside is just golden. Flip and cook for 30 seconds more. Transfer to a plate and repeat with remaining batter, stacking crepes with parchment or wax paper between them. You should get 8 crepes.
3. Fill and fold. Lay each crepe flat. Spread a thin layer of Dijon mustard across one half. Layer with ham, turkey, and Swiss cheese. Fold the crepe in half over the filling, then fold in half again to form a quarter-wedge shape. Repeat with all crepes.
4. Warm the filled crepes. Return the filled, folded crepes to the skillet over medium-low heat in batches. Cook for 1 to 2 minutes per side until the outside is lightly toasted and the cheese inside has begun to melt.
5. Serve. Plate 2 crepes per person. Dust generously with powdered sugar and serve immediately with warmed raspberry preserves on the side for dipping.

Nutrition (per serving)

Calories: 490 | Protein: 32g | Fat: 21g | Carbs: 42g | Fiber: 1g | Sodium: 1,040mg