I often call myself a food lovin’ freak but foodie would also do. And I’m definitely a little impatient: I want what I want, when I want it, and it has to be just so as I hold myself to the highest standards. My expectations are a little ridiculous—call me a perfectionist, if you will.
Well, I recently met my match in the Impatient Foodie herself: Elettra Wiedemann. She’s another lady who swoons over creating a killer meal. After over ten years of modeling, she decided to try on some new hats, founding a non-profit called One Frickin’ Day and opening a pop up restaurant called GOODNESS. The food world hooked her, leading her to launch a series of cooking videos and the Impatient Foodie blog, which she describes as her journey to figure out “how to grow, cook, bake, make, and preserve my own food, all while living in NYC and navigating a severe lack of patience and goldfish attention span.”
The title alone is brilliant, so to meet her and find that she was as energetic and fun as I’d hoped was icing on the cake. And speaking of cake—that’s just what we got down to! When I first reached out to Elettra about cooking together(nervously—I must admit) , she thrilled me by instantly saying yes and suggesting a crepe cake right off the bat. She’d been itching to try one out since tasting the infamous crepe cake creations from Lady M, and knew it would fit perfectly in the “Worth it or Not Worth It?” section of her site. Honestly, I was pretty nervous—a 20 layer crepe cake? When I’d never even made a crepe? I worried that it might be just a little too laborious for Eye-Swoon’s style.
But doubts aside, I was pumped to have Elettra in my kitchen! She arrived that morning, her sweet little dog in tow, with a massive jar of crepe batter that had needed to sit for 24 hours prior. I had worried the night before that I didn’t have the right tools—a crepe pan, for example, but Elettra’s sheer excitement calmed my nerves.
Well, it wasn’t entirely smooth sailing. Our first few attempts at a crepe resulted in burnt fingers and a sloppy, un-flippable mess. We remained confident, trying out different tools, but, sadly, the next…ahem…FIFTEEN crepes yielded one giant mess. We were so worried that we walked to West Elm Market to attempt to buy a proper crepe pan—but even that failed. But just as we began to consider this a “Not Worth It” attempt, we gave it one more shot with a new metal spatula we picked up.
To our surprise this little tool saved the day! It also required Winnie (my swoony photographer) stepping out from behind the lens to show us how it’s done. She delivered our first whole and flippable crepe and, finally, we were off!
Three hours later, with ten pretty good-looking crepes, we had succeeded. By this point we were just giddy—a sugar rush, perhaps? In the end, ten crepes was actually the perfect amount for a swoon-a-licious cake. We devoured it, giving each other high fives for turning things around. I hope this reminds you that, while the final pictures might look great, our cooking journeys are definitely not without bumps. We aren’t simply impatient foodies, but imperfect foodies, too—and with each other’s support, that felt totally okay.
Feeling inspired to make your own crepe cake? Check out the Lady M recipe here and on Impatient Foodie!
Signing off,
Imperfect Foodie xx
Photography by Winnie Au.
