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In my childhood I have memory of a clockwork crepe maker using an alcohol burner

Something like this

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The large drum had a circle of steel wrapped around it, and the clockwork motor rotated it against the pickup roller in the batter tray, which transfered batter only to the circle, not the whole drum. The alcohol burner heated the drum so by the time it got to the other side it was cooked and slid into the left hand tray. The crepes were nearly transparent, and just beautiful

The machine is very similar to how I understand commercial tortillas are made?

Can you still buy these, if so where?

If not, are there modern automatic crepe makers for domestic use? Looking for something way under a grand!

I can make a perfectly good crepe on the comal, but this is not fun for a whole party load!

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That's a very cool device. Unfortunately, I don't think I've ever seen something like that in the wild. Even in a production environment, I've never seen anything but a glorified circular hotplate. But then I live in the US, where crepes aren't very popular. –  bikeboy389 Dec 9 '10 at 14:51
Looks like there are a lot of industrial-style examples of what you depicted, but most seem to run in the $4000 range and make hundreds of crepes per hour. Seems a bit much for the home cook. –  bikeboy389 Dec 9 '10 at 14:58
That machine only cooks the crepes on one side. Wouldn't they stick together in the 'Finished' tray? –  Marti Dec 14 '10 at 14:26
You know, I could swear that I saw something like this at one of the "high-end" cookware stores around here. Unfortunately I can't remember much more about it (other than it was more than just a comal or crepe pan) since I never make a party load... but I'll keep an eye out for it next time I'm shopping. –  Aaronut Dec 14 '10 at 16:59
Thanks for that –  TFD Dec 15 '10 at 3:13

3 Answers 3

This is called a crepe maker drum or an automatic crepe maker.

CMCRP makes one that retails for about $5000 and can produce as much as 80m of crepes per hour (more than 1 mile / day). Probably worth it if you can afford it and need that many crepes. It is made by and can be purchased from "PastaBiz.com"

You can see a video of it on YouTube.

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Another model is the ANKO CR-200, a video can be found here, and you could contact ANKO to find a local distributor.

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Good Luck!

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Thanks for that. Not quite under a grand, but it does make square crepes :-] –  TFD Dec 17 '10 at 8:08
Maybe, if we all pitch in a few dollars, we can buy one of those machines and spread the joy. –  Chad Mar 9 '11 at 18:18

Funny, I was just thinking about this the other day. In my childhood there was a restaurant called The Crepery (or something similar) at the Washington Square Mall in a suburb of Portland, Oregon. It was part of a larger complex called The Park which was the 70s version of our modern day food court. They had a very similar type of crepe maker to the one you are describing. I am not sure what they were using for a heat source. I would have guessed electric. The unit looked like a small printing press or mimeograph machine sitting on their counter top. I seem to remember the steel spot on the drum rotating through batter then stopping at the top to cook for a moment. When finished, the drum would rotate and drop the crepe on a plate, then pick up more batter. It made absolutely perfect crepes in look, texture, and taste. The Marriott Corporation used to run this restaurant complex. I have inquired over the years but have had little luck just finding anyone who remembers having operated this restaurant let alone a drum type crepe maker. Several industrial suppliers have suggested that these may have been specially produced for the companies operating them. I've seen the YouTube video of the CMCRP and was quite impressed but I think this might be overkill for what I had in mind. Let me know if you have any luck finding what you are describing. I would love to buy one myself. Until then it's back to hand made! -Fairgrove

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Very appropriate to pull this back up on Pancake Day (or at least the hours after it). –  Orbling Mar 9 '11 at 0:30

Once a long time ago (1974) I went to Mexico and stopped in at a crepery run by a French lady. She made the most wonderful crepes you have ever tasted!! It was of the type that sat on the counter like the one you describe. Maybe if you enquired in Mexico, they might still sell that type. But 37 years later is a very long time I suppose to expect something like that to still be manufactured and in operation. But one never knows. Worth a look-see.


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