Buckwheat and Spelt Crépes

Post-Thanksgiving recovery week. Leftover turkey in every form: turkey sandwiches, turkey pho (yes — turkey bones make a decent pho broth if you add the right aromatics), turkey fried rice, and finally, turkey congee when the meat was starting to look tired and needed to be retired gracefully into rice porridge. I've been thinking about the Thanksgiving meal. Not the food — the people. Specifically, the way Ma looked at that table. She sat in her chair and her eyes moved around the room — Tyler carving, Emma serving, Lily with her pilgrim decorations, Linh's kids laughing, me standing in the kitchen doorway — and there was this expression on her face that I've never seen before. Not happiness exactly. Satisfaction. Like something she planted fifty years ago — when she got on that boat, when she sewed clothes in that garment factory, when she made pho from whatever she could find at Fiesta — had finally bloomed. She didn't say any of this. Mai Tran does not narrate her emotions. But I saw it. I saw it and I'll remember it. Back to reality: work picked up. Black Friday means restaurant equipment companies have sales too — commercial kitchen gear doesn't go on doorbuster deals, but we do volume discounts. I spent the week calling existing accounts and pitching upgrades. Sold a convection oven to a bakery in Rice Village. Sold a dishwasher to a pho restaurant on Milam. The pho restaurant owner, a guy named Thang who's been making pho for thirty years, asked me what kind of brisket I use for my pho. We talked for forty-five minutes about brisket and broth and fish sauce brands. I sold him a dishwasher but I gained a friend. Christine's week with the kids. Solo dinners. I made myself banh xeo — the Vietnamese crepe, crispy and sizzling, filled with shrimp, pork, bean sprouts, and onion. You eat it wrapped in lettuce with fresh herbs and dipped in nuoc cham. It's the kind of meal that's almost too much work for one person but I made it anyway because the act of cooking it — the sizzle of the batter in the hot pan, the flip, the assembly — is meditative. It's the thing I do instead of the thing I used to do. Seven and a half years sober. I don't count the days anymore — I counted obsessively in the first year, then weekly, then monthly, now annually. But I know the number. March 14, 2009. Some numbers you carry in your body, not just your brain.

That night making banh xeo — alone, sober, present — I kept thinking about the crepe itself: how the batter has to rest, how the pan has to be exactly right, how there’s no rushing it. The French have their thin eggy crépes; my family has banh xeo, turmeric-gold and crackling. This version splits the difference, using buckwheat and spelt for a nuttier, earthier batter that still crisps the way it should — something between a Vietnamese street snack and a Breton galette, which feels about right for a guy who’s always been between things. Here’s how I made them.

Prep Time: 10 min (plus 30 min rest) | Cook Time: 25 min | Total Time: 1 hr 5 min | Servings: 4 (about 8 crepes)

Ingredients

1/2 cup buckwheat flour
1/2 cup spelt flour
1/4 teaspoon fine sea salt
1/4 teaspoon turmeric (optional — echoes the golden color of banh xeo)
2 large eggs
1 1/4 cups whole milk (or unsweetened coconut milk for a nuttier flavor)
2 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted, plus more for the pan
1 teaspoon neutral oil (for cooking)

Suggested fillings (banh xeo-style):

1/2 pound medium shrimp, peeled and deveined
1/4 pound thin-sliced pork belly or pork loin, cut into bite-sized pieces
1 cup fresh bean sprouts
1/2 yellow onion, thinly sliced
2 scallions, sliced

For serving:

Butter lettuce or red leaf lettuce leaves
Fresh mint, cilantro, and/or Thai basil
Nuoc cham dipping sauce (fish sauce, lime juice, sugar, water, garlic, chili — adjust to taste)

Instructions

Make the batter. Whisk together buckwheat flour, spelt flour, salt, and turmeric (if using) in a medium bowl. Add eggs and about half the milk; whisk until smooth. Add remaining milk and melted butter and whisk again until the batter is thin and lump-free. Let rest at room temperature for at least 30 minutes — this is non-negotiable; it hydrates the flours and relaxes the gluten.
Prep your fillings. Season shrimp and pork lightly with salt and a pinch of pepper. Slice the onion thin. Have your bean sprouts rinsed and ready. Set everything near the stove before you start the crepes — once the pan is hot, things move fast.
Cook the fillings. Heat a 10-inch nonstick or well-seasoned carbon steel skillet over medium-high heat. Add a small splash of oil. Saute the pork for 2–3 minutes until just cooked through; remove and set aside. In the same pan, cook shrimp 1–2 minutes per side until pink; remove. Saute the onion slices 1 minute until slightly softened.
Cook the crepes. Reduce heat to medium. Add a small knob of butter to the pan and swirl to coat. Pour in about 1/4 cup of batter and immediately tilt and swirl the pan so the batter spreads into a thin, even round. Listen for the sizzle — that sound is the whole point. Cook 1–2 minutes until the edges are set and the bottom is golden and lightly crisp.
Add fillings and fold. Scatter a few pieces of pork, 2–3 shrimp, a small handful of bean sprouts, and a few onion slices over one half of the crepe. Cover the pan with a lid for 30–60 seconds to steam the sprouts just slightly. Fold the plain half over the filled half and slide onto a plate.
Repeat. Continue with remaining batter and fillings, adding butter to the pan between crepes as needed. Keep finished crepes loosely tented with foil while you work.
Serve. Bring the crepes to the table with a plate of lettuce leaves, fresh herbs, and a small bowl of nuoc cham. To eat: break off a piece of crepe, wrap it in a lettuce leaf with herbs, and dip. This is the ritual. Take your time with it.

Nutrition (per serving, crepes only without filling)

Buckwheat and Spelt Crépes — The Sizzle That Keeps Me Steady