Creperie - Egg, Cheese, and Tomato Sauce Crepe - Paris, France

In Portland, Oregon there is a little kiosk, in an upscale grocery store, called French Wrap where they make fresh crepes to order while you watch. The crepes themselves, buckwheat salty or white sweet, are impossibly thin and elastic. My favorite salty crepe was filled with fresh baby spinach, roma tomatoes and fresh mozzarella. (I am a sucker for these three ingredients.) The best sweet crepe was bananas soaked in rum, drizzled in chocolate, and topped with fresh whipped cream.

So how excited was I to go to Paris, the home of the fresh crepe? Right, and ripe for disappointment, too. This creperie was run by a Tunisian, which should have been a clue, maybe. The crepes were premade in a stack and reheated when you ordered. This made them tough and even crunchy in places. The egg in the egg and cheese crepe was beaten and poured on thin on top of the reheating crepe. Shredded cheese was sprinkled on next (it mostly didn't melt) and then a thick layer of spaghetti sauce on top of that. So unappetizing.

The chocolate and banana crepe was too sweet. The chocolate was actually melted Nutella, which is like cake frosting. Bleh. The whipped cream was out of a can.

The meal was edible, but bad.

Later on in the week, I had a good crepe from a stand along the Champs-Elysee who knew what they were doing. I videotaped him making my Grand Marnier crepe which took less than a minute. It was only a simple dessert crepe sprinkled with sugar and doused with liquor. Fabulous.