Cheese Blintzes

[Guest guest]

I come from a Jewish background

and married into a Lebanese family

we were married for 23 years..........so

i make a lot of Jewish and Lebanese food

 

also, i have a pan that i use just

for crepes......and nothing else is cooked in that pan................

 

*Cheese Blintzes*

 

*

*

*Source of Recipe**

The Jewish Delicatessen Online Cookbook

**

**

Making the filling is the easy part, so make the

crepes<http://www.recipecircus.com/recipes/lindatn/Blintzes/Cheese_Blintzes.html\

#>first.

(yield: depends, probably about 18)

**List of Ingredients**

 

 

 

MAKE THE CREPES

 

 

6 eggs – use the large ones

1 cup – water.

1 cup milk –

2 cup

flour<http://www.recipecircus.com/recipes/lindatn/Blintzes/Cheese_Blintzes.html#\

>–

use unbleached white flour –

1 pinch

salt<http://www.recipecircus.com/recipes/lindatn/Blintzes/Cheese_Blintzes.html#>\

–

Use Kosher salt, if you can. It has fewer stray flavors.

3 pinches sugar – what can I say, sugar isn't as sugary as salt is salty.

some oil – as little as possible. like soya or canola oil.

Whip the first three ingredients to a frenzy. Or, at least until everything

seems equally distributed. Now, adding a little at a time, blend in the

flour while continuing madly to whisk the batter. The idea here is to have

as few little pits of unblended flour as possible. When all the batter is

blended, add the salt and sugar and continue to whisk it up. When the s & s

have dissolved, strain the batter through a mesh strainer to remove any

undissolved salt or sugar crystals, pieces of random eggshell (Mendell!),

bloppy parts of the egg, etc. When done the batter should be about as thick

as a thin eggnog.

 

Choose a middle-sized sauté pan (maybe 8inches in diameter.) The first time

you make the crepes you might want to use a larger one, because rolling and

folding them into blintzes can be a challenge. And, as with mu shu

pancake<http://www.recipecircus.com/recipes/lindatn/Blintzes/Cheese_Blintzes.htm\

l#>at

Hong Fat's in New York, rolling your own crepe around a mound of

filling

can be daunting the first few (hundred) times. As far as the pan is

concerned, you can use a high quality Teflon finished pan, or the one you

always choose for omelets. Any pan that will resist sticking is okay, so

long as the pan itself is not a very lightweight pan. The heat has to

distribute evenly or the crepe thing won't work at all…lighter pans tend to

transfer heat from the source through the bottom of the pan without

spreading it out evenly across the surface. Rounded corners work better than

sharply vertical ones.

 

Drip a little of the oil into the pan, removing the excess so there is only

a sheen on the pan. You can wipe it glossy with a cloth towel if you have

confidence in the pan. (That sounds silly, doesn't it Micki?) Heat the pan

(not the oil) to a medium temperature.

 

When the pan is hot, drizzle a small amount of batter into the center of the

pan, then immediately tilt the pan back and forth, allowing the batter to

spread to the edges. By tilting the pan before the batter sets, you will be

able to get the raw batter to spread around better. Try to keep the batter

from pooling in the center or at any single place in the pan. The idea is to

form a very thin circle of cooked batter without holes in it. (Butter makes

a bitter batter better…no it's a joke. I just always liked that tongue

twister, it has nothing to do with this recipe.)

 

As soon as the batter sets and before it burns or sticks to the pan, turn

the whole pan upside down over a moistened cloth towel and give it a little

knock to dislodge the crepe. You can tease it from the surface of the pan

with a soft spatula, if necessary. But, if it requires that you scrape it

free, then the pan is too hot, or not slick enough or the batter is too thin

or thick or something else is wrong. (Good luck!) The crepe should be

puckered and just barely brown in spots underneath. On top it should have

the raw looking color of eggnog. Stack the crepes about 4 or five high, each

separated from the next with wax paper. When you have made a few dozen – or

run out of batter - sit down and thank your lucky stars you never promised

God that you'd do anything to make blintzes. (This enterprise takes

practice, determination and patience.)

 

**Recipe**

 

MAKE THE CHEESE FILLING

 

2 eggs – beaten.

1/2 lb cottage cheese

24 oz farmer's cheese. A typical package is 12 oz. If you can't find

farmer's cheese you can use ricotta. The consistency is right, but it

changes the flavor slightly.

1/2 tsp salt

2 tsp sugar

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

matzo

meal<http://www.recipecircus.com/recipes/lindatn/Blintzes/Cheese_Blintzes.html#>\

–

if necessary. We'll talk.

 

How

Blend the cheeses. At the risk of offending Grandma Anna, it is really

easier to do this with your hands. Just crumble the farmer cheese, then

shmush it all up. Wear surgical gloves if you must. Anyway, take the blended

cheese and dry it out by balling the cheese in, of all things, cheese cloth

and squeezing out the liquid. If you can't find cheesecloth, press it

carefully against the inside of a fine-mesh strainer-type colander.

 

In a non reactive bowl, blend in the eggs, sugar, salt, and vanilla. Now,

here's the tricky part. The cheese needs to be stiff, but smooth. And, of

course, until you have done this once or twice, it is hard to know what that

really means. The consistency should be along the lines of a slightly

grainy, slightly soft cream cheese. Not quite the consistency of whipped

cream<http://www.recipecircus.com/recipes/lindatn/Blintzes/Cheese_Blintzes.html#\

>cheese,

but getting there. So long as most of the liquid was squeezed from

the cheese in the first place, the eggs will help the mixture to tighten up

a bit as it cooks. If you've left a lot of water in the cheese it will run

out as the blintz cooks. It's not a pretty sight. If you think the cheese

will be too wet, separate a little bit out and cook a couple blintzes with

it the way it is. If you are right, and water oozes out of the blintz as it

cooks, add a matzo meal little by little to the mixture until it works.

Sorry, Erin, trial and error is the best I can offer.

 

SO MAKE THE BLINTZES, ALREADY

 

What

1 egg – beaten well, with a couple of drops of water.

 

How

Lay out the crepe with the soft side down - that's the side that looks like

eggnog. (You want the mixture to come into contact with this side of the

crepe because it has been cooked a little drier than the eggnog side. Any

wetness in the cheese mixture will be absorbed somewhat by the drier side of

the crepe. The soft eggnog side will begin to deteriorate in contact with

wetness from the cheese.) Depending upon the size of your crepes, spoon

three or four tablespoons of the mixture onto the crepe just where the smile

would be if the crepe were a face – about 1/4 of the distance from the

bottom. Instead of a smile, spread the cheese mixture into the shape of a

bar about 1 1/2 inches wide, 3/4 inch high straight across the crepe until

it extends within an inch of the outside. Now, carefully fold the edges of

the crepe below the smile up to the edge of the cheese and cover the cheese

with the crepe. If you've done this right, the edge of the bottom of the

crepe should just cover the cheese. Brush the exposed, eggnog side of the

crepe with a little of the beaten egg. This will help it stick to the other

face of the crepe when you put them together.

 

Without letting the cheese spread toward the top of the crepe, bring the two

sides of the crepe in until they fold over the edge of the egg-ed crepe,

forming three sides of the blintz. Again, without letting the cheese spread,

turn the blintz over and over, rolling it toward the top of the crepe. Brush

the beaten egg along the inside surface of the last part of the exposed

crepe just before you seal the blintz completely. Set it aside on the folded

edge and admire that handsome thing, why don't you. Be proud of yourself,

Hannah. Okay, enough, now roll the other 17 blintzes, stop wasting time.

 

The blintzes can be cooked now or set aside in the refrigerator. They may

even be frozen uncooked . If you intend to freeze them before cooking them,

it's best to freeze them on wax paper, without allowing the blintzes to

touch one another before they freeze. (You leave them alone for one minute,

one minute alone, I tell you, and those blintzes are going to cause

trouble!)

 

Cook the blintzes in a little canola oil. Some people swear by butter, but

I think the butter has a tendency to leave a burnt taste if you try to fry

them at too high a temperature. For best results, cook the blintzes in about

a 1/4 inch of oil over a low-moderate fire. Cook the blintzes on the folded

side first, then, when the blintz begins to turn golden brown, turn in the

direction of the fold (another words, pretend you are still rolling the

crepe around the cheese.) By the way, if you have a light touch, the best

way to handle blintzes in a frying pan is with a pair of cooks' tongs,

rather than trying to turn them with a spatula. The blintzes are done when

both sides are golden brown. Blot the excess oil and serve with sour cream

or some fresh berries or berry

fruit<http://www.recipecircus.com/recipes/lindatn/Blintzes/Cheese_Blintzes.html#\

>preserves.

Here at Jack Cooper's we dust the blintzes with powdered sugar

and offer sour cream as a condiment. I find them sweet enough without the

sugar. You decide. It's a free country.

 

 

Our recipes are not kosher*

 

--

 

Linda in Tennessee

http://lindatn37932.tripod.com/