Maybe not, but I wasn't convinced when I first saw this recipe.

Even when I decided to make this dish for my food families, I was thinking I might serve it as a warm lentil salad with the cucumber and tomato raita on the side. (I cook each week on Wednesdays for three other families and deliver dinner to their houses. The rest of the week they take turns cooking and delivering to mine.)

In the end, I made it just as we learned it in a pilot class at the Inland Northwest Culinary Academy at Spokane Community College. The school is hosting a new series of cooking classes that will be called INCA After Dark. The story is in Wednesday's food section or online.

Chef Peter Tobin guided us through crepe making and the Indian curry spiced lentil filling. We had so much fun flipping crepes and chatting about the new program. We made raita from yogurt the students make at the college.

The classes will be offered every month in the INCA kitchens at the Spokane Community College. Updated class offerings will be online at incaafterdark.scc.spokane.edu soon.

Savory Crepes

From Chef Peter Tobin, Inland Northwest Culinary Academy and INCA After Dark

2 cups Shasta yellow or Sunrise red lentils (see note)

4 cups water

1 slice lemon

Pinch salt

1 cup potato, diced 1/2 inch

1 cup carrots, diced 1/2 inch

12 whole cloves

8 cardamom pods

2 inch cinnamon stick

2 tablespoons fresh ginger

2 tablespoons fresh garlic

3 tablespoons olive oil

1 onion sliced thin

1/2 Serrano chili, minced

1 1/2 cups cooked Basmati rice

1 tomato seeded and cided

1/2 cup plain yogurt

1 tablespoon mint, chopped

2 tablespoons cilantro, chopped

1 cup water

Salt and black pepper to taste

Bring water to a boil wiht lemon and a pinch of salt. Add potatoes and carrots and lentils. Cook 5 minutes, until lentils are soft, but still have some bite. Drain and hold warm

Combine cloves, cardamom and cinnamon in a spice grinder and grind.

Heat a skillet over medium-high heat; add oil. Add onions and lightly brown. Add ginger, garlic, chili, yogurt and water. Add drained lentils, potato and carrot mixture, along with cooked rice.

Cook until headed through 5-10 minutes.

Note: Tobin recommends using Shasta or Sunrise lentils from PNW. Our story about PNW is here.

Yield: 10 servings

Crepe Batter

1 cup flour

1 teaspoon salt

10 eggs

2 cups milk

4 tablespoons melted butter

Sift flour and salt into a small bowl. Combine egg and milk in a separate medium bowl.

Whip wet ingredients into dry slowly. Whip until heavy cream consistency. Add butter.

Rest 15 minutes. Heat a non-stick egg pan over medium heat. Season pan with a bit of oil on a paper towel or a brush dipped in oil.

Add 2 tablespoons crepe batter and swirl around in pan. Lightly brown on one side and flip to the other side to brown (don't worry, the first one never works). Remove from pan and continue to make crepes until all hte batter is used. Cool crepes completely/ individually on counter before stacking or they will stick together.

Yield: About 40

Raita

2 cups plain yogurt

1 cucumber, peeled, seeded and diced

1/2 cup tomato, seeded and diced

1/2 Serrano chili, chopped fine

1 tablespoon cilantro, chopped

Combine ingredients and hold at room temperature.

To serve crepes, fill crepe with lentil filling and roll up. Place seam-side down on a plate and top with raita.

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