It is great to have an appetizer that you know will be a winner. Our neighborhood wine club has turned into a “Bring An Appetizer” competition. A Gougère that combines all the food groups: cheese, ham, butter, eggs, flour and milk is guaranteed to delight your friends.
I have been a fan of Gougères for years. We had them at a party and I got the recipe from the cook. When I first made it, the result wasn’t up to expectations. Some time later, I saw a recipe for Gougères in Rosso’s and Lukins’s Silver Palate Cookbook and realized that the cook who gave me the recipe, had left out the egg-wash step. It is amazing what the addition of an egg wash does to the flavor and texture profile. I am not saying that the person who gave me the recipe left it out on purpose but…
Gougères are a French Cheese Puffs. The basic concept has been around for hundreds of years and exists in many of the world’s cuisines. Working with Kraft in international markets, we quite often would offer cheese solutions to manufacturers of similar products. We probably made our customers mad by telling them the old Kraft advertising tag line of: How does America spell cheese: K-R-A-F-T! One of my favorites cheese puffs was the Brazilian Pao de Queijo. Brazil was a tough place to do business. Somehow using American cheese science in a French application to make a Brazilian staple got lost on the Brazilian market. Either we were stupid or just ahead of our time.
One of the things I love about Gougères is how adaptable they are. For our wine club last week I added a ham and cheese layer and then sprinkled prosciutto on top before baking. The resulting product disappeared in the flash. You know you have a winner when your appetizer is the first to go.
There are several ways to make Gougères:
- As a ring on a baking sheet
- Dropped like cookies on a baking sheet
- Baked in a mini-muffin mold
- Baked in cup cake molds
My current favorite is the cup cake mold. It adds definition to the cheese puff and works really well with additions.
Above: The Gougères Mise En Place
INGREDIENTS
- 1 stick unsalted butter
- ¼ cup shallots, finely minced (Optional)
- 1 cup milk
- 1 cup all purpose flour
- 5 eggs (4 for the batter and one for an egg-wash)
- 2 cups Parmesan Cheese (blends of Parmesan and Romano or Parmesan and Swiss also work well)
- Pam cooking spray or a tablespoon of butter to grease the baking mold or sheet
- 3 slices of prosciutto cut into thin strips for topping
- 5 slices of ham cut into 24 1.5 inch squares
- 5 slices of Swiss cheese cut into 24 1.5 inch squares
- 1 teaspoon kosher salt
INSTRUCTIONS
- Preheat oven to 400°.
- In a medium sized pot, melt the butter.
- Add shallots and sauté under low heat until the shallots become translucent (4 minutes).
- Add milk and bring to a boil.
- Take the pot off of the heat. Add flour and stir vigorously with a wooden spoon until flour and butter are combined.
- Add four of the eggs, one at a time, stirring each with the wooden spoon until all four are incorporated.
- Add 1 cup of Parmesan cheese and salt. Fold together into the dough.
- Spray a non-stick mold or baking sheet with Pam or grease with butter
- Place dough in a plastic bag and snip off a small corner of the bag. Then deposit a table spoon of batter into each muffin cup. Use a small brush to even out the batter in the bottom of the mold
- Place a slice each of ham and cheese on top of the batter
- Add another tablespoon of batter on top.
- Using your small brush smooth out the top layer of batter
- Scramble the remaining egg in a separate bowl. Brush each section with the egg-wash.
- Sprinkle on the remaining Parmesan cheese and prosciutto as a topping.
- Place in oven and bake for 25 minutes or until the puffs are a deep golden brown.
- Remove puffs from the cupcake mold and serve.
Note: You can make these an hour in advance. Remove them from the cup cake mold, place on a ban and reheat in a 350° oven for 5 minutes. They are even great the next morning just heated in the microwave.
Give this recipe a try for a guaranteed winner!
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