8

If I will heat the stone in the oven, will it retain heat long sufficiently once out of the oven to make a few crepes? Will the dough not stick to the stone and will it distribute uniformly or it will form patches?

Noir
  • 256
  • 2
  • 8

3 Answers3

19

I think it's a bad idea...

Crepes are made with a batter (as opposed to a dough) spread thin over a hot metal plate (seasoned or oiled).

crepe maker

A baking stone has a porous surface and I suppose the batter would just get stuck to your stone. It doesn't happen with a dough because it has enough structure to not fill every pore of the stone on contact.

On the other hand, if you had a baking steel instead... that might work, they usually have enough mass to hold heat for some time (and they don't crack).

baking steel

(disclaimer: I'm not associated with the brand, but I do have one of these and it's awesome)

Pre-heat it, brush oil over it and spread your batter. I'm not sure how many crepes you can do before having to send the steel back to the oven, and then it will take a while to have it hot again, so it might not be practical.

Luciano
  • 4,794
  • 2
  • 20
  • 40
  • 3
    A good answer. When I put an unbaked dough, for instance pizza, on my stone I need to put a load of semolina, flour or the like to keep it from sticking like glue, a batter would be nearly impossible to get off. – GdD Jun 06 '19 at 10:10
  • 1
    Thank you, Luciano. To me, however, utilising baking steel on top of such stone does not look like a very good idea either. Steel isn't known to be a non-stick surface... – Noir Jun 06 '19 at 10:14
  • 7
    Like I said, you have to oil the surface. It's how crepe is traditionally made. Also I don't mean to use the baking steel _on top of_ the stone, but _instead of_. – Luciano Jun 06 '19 at 10:57
  • Do you imply enamel-coated steel? – Noir Jun 06 '19 at 11:10
  • 3
    Not coated, just oiled stainless steel. If you search for "baking steel" you're going to find a few different brands with different thickness / sizes, but it's essentially a thick slab of steel (thick enough that it doesn't warp / bend). – Luciano Jun 06 '19 at 11:26
  • 1
    @Noir A standard crepe hot plate is *also* made out of stainless steel. The non-stick-ness comes from seasoning it with oil. – Sneftel Jun 07 '19 at 08:09
  • seasoning it like a cast iron pan, for reference. – SnakeDoc Jun 07 '19 at 23:11
  • @GdD Do you put the pizza on the cold stone? Usually you preheat the stone, and I've never had problems with anything sticking to the stone. Also one of the primary usage instructions with the stones I know is "let it cool down in the oven with the oven door closed" - they will crack otherwise. So this is another reason not to try it. – Nobody Jun 08 '19 at 20:12
  • Normally, in home conditions where you don't buy specialized equipment, crepes are made in a large skillet on a stove, with generous amounts of oil. Common cheap thin non-stick skillets are best for that task. – SF. Jun 10 '19 at 11:33
  • 1
    SF - Not sure if this is what you call "specialized equipment" but I have a carbon steel crepe pan (inexpensive, easy to fine online) that I've used for years. Before heating, I spread a tiny bit of oil with a paper towel, I heat it well, and 8 out of 10 times the first crepe is presentable (although I tend it eat it anyway!). Plus, I don't have to re-oil for all the other crepes. – Arlo Jun 11 '19 at 20:06
  • @Luciano, do you not think that thickness of a slab of stainless steel will affect the extent to which batter tends to stick to it? – Noir Jun 17 '19 at 12:10
  • @Noir the thickness has nothing to do with stickiness (even though it rhymes). As long as the surface is oiled / seasoned it should not stick. But given so many better alternatives the temperature control here will be finicky, it would be better to just use a skillet as others suggested. – Luciano Jun 17 '19 at 13:22
  • @Luciano, firstly thank you. I'm apologize, I had to say, that I would like to know whether the batter sticks to stainless steel if I will supply heat to it continuously. My problem was not that I want to avoid using a heating device, but that I want to avoid using seasoned cast iron, teflon and cookware having a glaze of unknown composition that may contain toxic compounds. I also want to make large crepes, like pizza. – Noir Jun 18 '19 at 06:27
  • Like I said, oil the surface and it won't stick. Reapply if it starts to stick. The steel will get seasoned at some point (it gets darker and darker, that's normal) – Luciano Jun 18 '19 at 08:15
  • @Noir: Teflon is about as health-neutral as they get. It's so chemically unreactive any bits of it that may get into the food will pass your digestive tract unchanged, and none will if you use wooden or plastic spatula; only metal tools can scrape it. It may transition into harmful chemicals if you severely overheat it, but at that point you'll burn your crepes into coal or set your oil on fire. – SF. Jun 19 '19 at 09:11
17

No, don't do it.

Good crepes are made within narrow parameters of heat exchange. You can observe this when making crepes on the stovetop - the first crepe is almost always bad. The pan seems to be either not hot enough, or too hot. After the first one, it somehow "stabilizes", or extra heat starts to creep on you. In the second case, it will get too hot after a while, and your crepes will start throwing bubbles on the first side and burning on the second.

If you are in the good zone though, and decide to reduce the heat - say because you have been making nice crepes for the past 20 minutes and now it is your last crepe and you want to turn off the plate early - you will end up with a bad crepe again, even if you think that you have enough heat left over from keeping the pan (and the plate below it) hot for so long.

Given that crepes are so sensitive to temperature, I wouldn't even start experimenting with your stone setup. If you don't have a stove, get a portable plate, they are cheap and versatile and don't take up much space. I used to have an induction unit that was quite nice and made good crepes.

rumtscho
  • 134,346
  • 44
  • 300
  • 545
  • 3
    Good point, the first crepe is always eaten by the cook, because it's never presentable –  Jun 06 '19 at 21:05
  • 1
    Cooking crepes is a science (or more like alchemy, +1). There has to be a thousand ways you can make them, *NONE of which DO NOT* use a frying pan. – Mazura Jun 08 '19 at 03:29
  • also works with a campfire... but only when making some bay beside it, where to push a little ember into; else they're black soon. baking steel might work, but distributing the batter might not work as expected - plus the risk of burnt fingers. –  Jun 08 '19 at 20:16
  • @MartinZeitler, how the batter will distribute on a baking steel, as you saw or imagine it? – Noir Jun 12 '19 at 09:08
0

All of the baking stones I know need to be slowly heated and cooled down - i.e. they go into the oven before it's turned on, and stay in the oven (with the door closed) after it's turned off. Otherwise you might find yourself holding pieces of your baking stone, with the rest of the heavy and hot stone falling on your feet, wooden floor, pet, etc.

So don't try this for safety reasons.

Nobody
  • 203
  • 2
  • 10