Crepe escape

La Cantine du Torchon's savoury crepes. Photo / Herald on Sunday

By all rights, and if the weather is behaving itself, the heat should well and truly be on right now. But high summer temps can leave you feeling as flat as a pancake when it comes to cooking.

You need something light, lovely and cost efficient to eat - which is why we have come up with a great range of crepes.

La Cantine du Torchon
265 Ponsonby Rd, Ponsonby
Ph (09) 376 2516
Open Tuesday to Friday, 11am to late; Saturday 8.30am to late and Sunday 8.30am to 4pm
Closed Monday

La Cantine - petite soeur of Pastis (Victoria St) and Torchon (Elliott Stables) - is both wine bar and creperie.

Legitimate in French ownership, you can rely on crepes of considerable credibility at any of these addresses. (There's an a-la-carte menu at each, too for the spoilsports who won't take part of the crepe side of things.) The Ponsonby outlet has a dinky outdoor garden.

It does, commendably, both a full range of galettes (gluten-free savoury buckwheat crepes) and sweet crepes (from which a small person gives particularly high praise to the banana and chocolate sauce "with no banana").

His mother loves the Toulouse galette - egg and cheese with Toulouse sausage. She notes with glee that they do a decent winelist too.

Price range: $5.50 to $15.50.

Note: hours vary for the siblings. Pastis does crepes lunchtime only.

Voila
573 Sandringham Rd, Sandringham
Ph (09) 846 8393
Closed until January 13, then open 7.30am to 4.30pm, Tuesday to Sunday

Voila sits among the Halal butchers, et al, on Sandringham Road. It is the most unprepossessing of addresses, and one of the warmest of heart ever to be enjoyed. They do every possible galette and crepe permutation - from the ludicrously simple (lemon and sugar) to the traditional (mushroom, ham, egg and cheese, crepes suzette) to the luxuriant La Vignole (artichokes, feta, sauteed potatoes, French beans, chutney).

Still hungry? They do breads and cakes and all sorts of other dishes, too (all made on the premises). Voila is truly a labour of love. You don't go for the decor - but you can be assured of delighting in all you feast upon.

Price range: $6 to $19.00.

The Strawberry Farm
127 Kirkbride Rd, Mangere
Open 10am-6pm, seven days a week

For something considerably more rustic, try a trek out in the direction of the airport. The principal purpose of your visit may well be the procurement of some of the most succulently robust strawberries you ever did see, but you'd be denying yourself another of life's pleasures if you did not stop for a pancake. So let's look on it as a variation on the crepe.

They are as big as a dinner plate and as light and lovely as the air you breathe. They come with icecream, chocolate sauce, maple syrup, and (perforce) strawberries. Eat al fresco on takeaway plates at the wooden tables, watch the strawberries being picked as you dine and admire a more leisurely lifestyle.

Did we mention the real fruit icecreams they also do? And don't leave without some of the garden fresh veges always on sale - fresh from their own grounds. A true piece of market-gardening genius.

Prices: pancakes (available only in strawberry season) $5 single; $7 double. Icecreams $3.50 (kiddie cone $3.) Remember to take cash; there's no Eftpos.

The Rainbow Valley Farm crepe stall, Matakana Farmer's Market
2 Matakana Valley Rd, Matakana
Hours: 8am to 1pm, Saturday

It would be well worth your while to get up early and make the one-hour drive north to Matakana, purely for this purpose. The crepe stall, right by the river's edge, is a foundation member of the Matakana market. Everything there is organic (except for the cheese). Most ingredients come from Trish Allen's nearby Rainbow Valley Farm - an organic and permaculture venture of many years' standing. Chief crepe-maker Jocelyn Winters offers three varieties of crepe: herb and cheese, lemon and honey or chocolate.

It's a zero-waste operation, which means your crepes are served on canna lily or banana leaves - which are later composted. They don't even hand out serviettes: they provide fresh flannel wipes instead.

Cooking legend and local food-heroine Lauraine Jacobs attests to the gorgeousness of these concoctions. "Absolutely delicious," she says.

Price: sweet crepes $3 single; $5 for two; herb and cheese $4.