First Bite: Crepes And Bubble Tea At Crepe House

It’s a full-on family business at the newly opened Crepe House (475A Myrtle Avenue), which serves savory and sweet Japanese-style crepes along with hot and cold bubble tea at affordable prices that are perfect for students, workers, and budget-conscious residents alike.

Owned by husband-and-wife team Jai and Bi Chen, who live and raised their family in Sunset Park, the restaurant opened its doors shortly before the start of Lunar New Year on February 8, and have slowly begun to gain a loyal following.

Also perfect? The wide variety of flavor combinations — 20 in all — that utilize fresh ingredients ranging from kiwis and strawberries to grilled chicken, baby corn, sesame, and avocado.

“We use fresh fruits, the chicken is grilled right here, and we make crepes like flowers, not French-style — we like to be more creative,” explained the couple’s daughter Jenny, who also works at the eatery, and whose young sons were doing homework when we visited this morning during public schools’ mid-winter recess.

So far, we’ve tried two sweet options and one savory: the #8 (Exotic Paradise), #12 (Fruit Paradise), and #15 (Chicken). All three begin with a base of a giant thin-yet-sturdy fresh-off-the-griddle/made-to-order crepe. Then, for the sweet options, a thin layer of whipped cream might be added, topped with all the fresh fruit, rolled up and a scoop of ice cream — in our case, vanilla (for #8) and green tea (for #12) — added. The #12 also includes cracker sticks coated with chocolate, also known as Pocky sticks, a popular snack in China, Asia, and Chinatowns across the world.

We weren’t sure what to expect of the flavors or texture, but Crepe House hits it out of the park.

Served in a leak-free cardboard paper cone, the sweet crepes are at once refreshing (real fruit!) and decadent (ice cream!), and the savory Chicken — which featured grilled chicken slices, lettuce, baby corn, red peppers, tofu, sesame, cucumber, and red carrot — was incredibly filling works wonderfully with the creamy dressing squirted on top, post-rollup. As a bonus, none of them are at all messy.

All crepes range from $6.50 to $7.50, and can also be customized. For example, we asked for our Fruit Paradise to have the green tea ice cream and chocolate sticks served separately, and we added avocado to our Chicken crepe.

The bubble tea also doesn’t disappoint. If you’ve never had the drink, it’s basically milk tea or fruit iced or green tea (mango, kumquat, papaya, strawberry, lemon, kiwi, honeydew) with either fat tapioca balls or fruit jellies floating around in it. The effect: sip your tea and you get balls of chewy goodness popping into your mouth, too.

We tried the basic iced milk bubble tea and it was addictive, even to our seasoned bubble tea tastebuds. There was no hint of milk powder, thankfully, as other bubble tea shops in New York CIty are often wont to use instead of actual tea.

Verdict: A great lunch or quick dinner spot for under $10 a meal, you can’t go wrong — or hungry, with these portion sizes — with Crepe House, which is already on our list of go-to places in the neighborhood and should be on yours. Delivery is available within a five-block radius for now and requires you call their phone line; they will soon join Seamless as well once they settle in.

Also, get 20% off all February as a grand opening special!

CREPE HOUSE
475A Myrtle Avenue
929-276-3889
Open daily from 11am to 10:30pm
Delivery: $15 minimum within a five-block radius (for now)