Crepes with sweet barley & apple preserve

Having been living away from parents for so long, one thing not very good is, no one to remind me to eat more health food.

Always in the streets or on bus in Barcelona, I see people snack on mandarine oranges or sunflower seeds, good vitamine, good fiber! I used to eat them too, but that was a long long time ago... my mom will totally disapprove what I have for breakfast - a chocolate bar and a cup of cafe con leche (similar to cappucino).

Being lazy isn't any reason. Mom will say it before I open my mouth...

She is right. This breakfast doesn't take much work. To save more time, cook the crepes and barley (I used store-bought apple preserve) before bed. Next morning by the time your finished pouring milk into your cereal bowl, these fruit-n'-grain-filled crepes are already all set!

Seems to me, barley is widely used in savory dish in western recipes. However, in my home country, it is always a dessert, barley cooked with simple syrup is one of the examples. So I did what I familiar for this breakfast. To make barley & apple preserve-filled crepes, you will need:

• Basic on 2 servings (2 crepes per serving):
• 10 - 12 tbps apple preserve with superb quality
• half of apple (or other fruit you prefer), finely diced
• 1/3 cup barley
• some water
• some natural raw sugar
• a couple pieces of lemon peels, yellow part only
• 4 crepes, about 18 cm in diameter. I used the pre-mixed. For home-made version, please refer to Lore's recipe
• some butter (I prefer) or cooking oil

Directions:

1. Combine apple preserve with the cut apple, set aside.
2. To cook barley: boil barley with some water for about 25 minutes or your preferable texture. In the last 10 minutes cooking, add lemon peel and spoonfuls of raw sugar. Drain. Set aside.
3. To make the crepes: I like to use two frying pans (18cm), explanation follows. First, to make sure the batter is quite thin. Slightly grease one pan with butter, warm it up for 30 seconds or so over low heat (not hot! otherwise the batter will set too soon before you can evenly spread it out, the crepes end up thicker). Pour some batter in, swirl the pan and let the batter run allover the bottom. Now, raise up the heat immediately to medium-high or high setting, the crepes should turn golden brown in a min. Flip and cook the other side. Done. For the next crepes I use the 2nd frying pan, therefore I don't need to wait for the first pan to cool off.
4. To assemble: Combine apple preserve with barley (my ratio is 3:1), place it on one end of crepes, roll up.
5. Plain yogurt and a bit of mint on the side, if you prefer.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------