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Centre-Val de Loire
Sanciau
A crêpe so thick it cannot be tossed: in Berry, "the sanciau is heavy".
Pastry or bakery speciality from Centre-Val de Loire.
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Centre-Val de Loire
A crêpe so thick it cannot be tossed: in Berry, "the sanciau is heavy".
Pastry or bakery speciality from Centre-Val de Loire.
AI-generated illustration
In Berry as in Bourbonnais, the sanciau is a kind of thick crêpe; it is also called "chanciaux" in Berry, and "sauciaux" or "grapiaux" in Nivernais. A glossary of the Berrichon dialect also defines it as a "kind of thick crêpe", plain, with bacon or with apples. Today, it is most often a large crêpe covered with apples, which Berry Province, the tourist promotion website for Berry, presents as a "typically Berrichon" dessert. In Indre, the Tables & Auberges directory lists it among the department's pastries, alongside the échaudé de la Brenne, the beugnon, the croquet de Charost and the massepain d'Issoudun.
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In Berry, sanciaux were not eaten only at Mardi Gras or Candlemas: peasants often ate them after their morning soup. The heritage blog gilblog describes it as a "poor man's dish", which, it writes, Hippolyte-François Jaubert's Berrichon dictionary defines as a "thick flour omelette". The same blog suggests, with a tentative "perhaps", that the name "chanciaux" may stem from a Candlemas belief: holding the handle of the frying pan with a coin in hand was said to bring good fortune. Berry Province, for its part, offers its recipe "on the occasion of Candlemas".
Appearance
A thick crêpe, more substantial than an ordinary crêpe because of its thickness: "the sanciau must be thick, that is just how it is", writes gilblog. Today's version is a large crêpe often covered with apples.
Aroma
During cooking, according to gilblog, the "scent of cooked apples" wafts everywhere.
Taste
Sliced apples browned in butter, sometimes flambéed with a dash of pear liqueur, beneath a crêpe batter coated in sugar. gilblog prefers apples that are "a little tart but juicy" to Golden Delicious.
Texture
Thick and heavy, to the point that it is flipped with a plate rather than tossed.
the thick crêpe without topping.
the thick crêpe garnished with bacon, according to the Berrichon glossary.
the glossary spells it "sanciau aux poumes"; today, it is most often a large crêpe covered with apples.
in Bourbonnais, where it is a winter dish, the batter is poured over a generous bed of browned onions, giving it a flavour of "sweet onion"; diners find it "filling".
in Berry, a fritter made of flour, honey and oil.
cut into slices, they are browned in butter in the pan, then Berry Province flambés them with a dash of pear liqueur.
it is poured over the apples and cooked over a low heat for around 7 minutes.
on a platter, coated in sugar and sliced like a tart.
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The sanciau is eaten hot or warm, as an afternoon snack or dessert, and Berry Province serves it at snack time, cut into slices like a tart. The recipes from gilblog and Berry Province both slip in a touch of alcohol: a drop of marc, pear or plum brandy into the batter for the former, and a dash of pear liqueur to flambé the apples for the latter.
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