Savoury Cheesy Pancakes

Sweet pancakes are in my eyes best enjoyed simply with sugar and lemon. However pancakes should not be just relegated to a pudding status, they are a versatile platform with their roots being found in beef wellingtons, preventing moisture from the beef, mushroom and pâté stuffing causing the dreaded soggy bottom. So I say let’s rejoice in the dynamic ingredient that is a pancake and lets smother them in cheese.

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  What you need:

  
  

  Pancakes:
  

  • 3 eggs
  • 85 g of plain flour
  • 100 ml of whole milk
  • salt

  
  

  Cheese Sauce:

  
  

  • 2 leeks
  • ½ a block of gouda
  • 25 g butter
  • 25 g of plain flour
  • 300 ml of whole milk
  • 2 bay leaves
  • 1 tsp black peppercorns
  • 1 clove of garlic
  • a smidge of grated nutmeg
  • oh and some good quality ham!

  
  

  How to make it:

  
  

  1. Start of by trimming up the leeks, slicing them in half to wash out any residual git/ mud. Putting the leeks flat side down on your chopping board, cut them up into 1 cm thick ribbons. Get a frying pan on and melt some butter in it, quickly throwing in the leeks once the butter has melted.  Season the leeks in the pan at the start; this draws moisture from the greens breaking down the cellular structure “cooking” the leeks faster without colouring them. You want to keep the green colour, but you don’t want to have a crunch to the vegetables and that is what the salt helps to do.  Take the leeks off the medium to high heat after 5 minutes.
  2. Now while the leeks are being cooked make up the pancake batter. Whisk together the eggs flour and milk. You may need to adjust the amount of milk required as its dependent upon how dry your flour is; the consistency should be between milk and single cream. Lumps are fine no need to over beat.
  3. Making the cheese sauce requires a roux, a term for melted butter mixed with flour and with flavoured milk. Start with the milk, put it in a sauce pan and add in torn bay leaves, garlic clove which you have stabbed with a fork and the peppercorns. Bring the milk to the boil grate in the nutmeg and then let it cool. Once cool strain the milk removing all the bits. Now melt the butter in a sauce pan and throw in the flour, mixing thoroughly with a wooden spoon! After a minute of the butter and flour cooking in the pan add in the cold milk in 4 parts to the butter, now whisking thoroughly to remove all the lumps. When all the milk is combined cook on a low heat for 5 minutes ensuring the flour is cooked through. –What do we mean when we say the flour is “cooked through”? Flour is a thickening agent, individual grains of flour absorb moisture /water from their environment causing them to swell 30x’s larger than their original volume. The swelling therefore makes it difficult for other molecules to get past these fat flour granules slowing down the movement of the liquid resulting in a thicker and more viscous sauce! -
  4. To the hot béchamel (butter flour milk mix) add in your grated cheese (gouda worked really well) and leeks and mix, saving a quarter of the cheese.
  5. Now let’s make the pancakes, melt butter in medium to high temperature frying pan and add just enough of the batter to cover the bottom of the pan, cook for a minute each side until they take on a golden colour. Repeat until you have used all your batter (it should be enough to make 6 large pancakes). Keep the cooked pancakes in a tea towel to keep warm.
  6. To each pancake add slices of ham and cheese sauce and torn parsley. Roll up the pancake and place in a roasting tin or deep sided oven tray. Repeat and rack up the pancakes. Add the remainder of the cheese sauce to the top of the rolled pancakes, sprinkling on the rest of the cheese. Grill the pancakes until golden on top and oozy!

  
  

  -serve with a salad ‘coz this is cheesy!-