I am French and I make every Sunday crêpes for breakfast. The crêpes are great (I am told :)) but I rarely manage to get a homogenous batter. First, the batter (NSFW :))
The clumps are not simply flour-based, my guess is that this is the butter clumping with flour, helped by the liquid (milk or milk + water, or milk + sparkling water).
I think this is the case because once I pour this liquid + white stuff on the pan, they disappear (= melt) and the resulting crêpe looks good (below the recto and verso):
The usual order I make the batter is:
- egg + a bit of sugar
- some flour to make a paste
- melted butter
- some more flour to make the paste
- some milk, baking powder, liquid vanilla
- some more flour
- some more milk
→ the point is to keep a homogenous paste, which would then finally be diluted by the milk.
So I end up with the amount of paste (the consistency is of a very heavy cream) I believe will be good for the day and I slowly dilute it with milk.
And I end up with the white stuff.
Is there a more optimal order to get a homogenous batter? I sometimes get one but never remember what I changed in the order.
Just to clarify: the crepes are great once they are done, it is just that handling the batter is not easy when I have to somehow get some liquid and some of the white stuff each time.