France: Gougères

I’m sure it comes as no surprise that most recipes in my Travel-Inspired Baking category are sweets—either delectable desserts or pleasing pastries.  This time, though, I give thee a baked French hors d’hoeuvre that’s light and savory, pairs beautifully with wine, and will knock les chaussettes off your guests.  Introducing, les gougères.

Martha’s Cheese & Herb Gougères have a bit more puff than her Blue Cheese-Walnut Variation, which are the stars of this show.

A few years ago we had la bon chance to dine in the Jules Verne restaurant in the Eiffel Tower, a dining experience that almost didn’t happen.* I wish I could recall all the courses we ate on that otherwise memorable day, but one thing is certain: they did not serve gougères.  Too bad, too, because if the meal we had was anything to go by, they would have been extraordinaire.

*If you’d like to learn about that epic(urean) adventure, read this:

• Metro Misery in the City of Light

Otherwise, let’s get baking.

Blue Cheese-Walnut Gougères(Cheese & Herb variation follows)

Recipe Adapted From: Martha Stewart’s French Food for Felons Baking Handbook

Level of Difficulty: medium—it’ll take a bit of practice to get your piping right

Time Consumption: medium

Kitchen Destruction: low, but if you have five cookie sheets like I do, you’ll use them all

Wow Factor: high, especially if you let slip that you used your piping bag with your homemade pâte à choux.  That’ll intimidate impress many non-cooks.  Also, people LOVE eating them, tossing them into their mouths like popcorn while making embarrassing moaning noises.

Ingredients:

• 1¼ C all-purpose flour
• 1 stick (½ cup) unsalted butter
• 2 tsp salt
• 1 tsp sugar
• ¼ tsp paprika
• ¼ tsp black pepper
• ¼ tsp ground nutmeg
• 4 large, whole eggs, plus 1 large egg white, if needed
• 1/3 c walnuts, coarsely chopped
• 5 oz (≈ ¾ cup) finely crumbled blue cheese

Special Equipment:

• Piping bag (if you cut off the corner of a Ziploc, that’ll do)
• ½-inch plain piping tip (such as an Ateco #808)

Official piping bag. Alas, it’s disposable. Note to self: get a cloth one.

Directions:

Preheat oven to 425°F.  Line up to five baking sheets with parchment paper or nonstick baking mats such as Silpats™.

(At this point, Martha wants you to pre-mark where you’ll put each gougère by dipping a round cookie cutter in flour and making powdery circles on the lined cookie sheet.  Unless you’re legally blind, this is a pointless waste of time.  Just pipe the gougères about 2 inches apart and you’ll be fine.  Honestly, Martha . . . )

In a medium saucepan, combine 1 cup water with the butter, salt, sugar, paprika, pepper, and nutmeg over medium-high heat.  Bring mixture to a boil and immediately remove from heat.  Using a wooden spoon, add flour, stirring vigorously until flour is no longer visible.  Return pan to medium-high heat.  Cook, stirring constantly, until mixture pulls away from the sides of the pan and forms a film on the pan’s bottom, about 4 minutes.

Transfer mixture to the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with a paddle attachment.  Mix on low speed until lightly cooled, about 1 minute.  Add 3 eggs, one at a time, mixing on medium speed until incorporated.  Lightly beat the 4th egg and add a little at a time until the batter is smooth and shiny.  Test the batter by touching it lightly with your finger and lifting—it should form a soft peak.  If it doesn’t, the batter needs more egg.  If you’ve added all the egg and soft peaks still won’t form, add the egg white, a little at a time, until it does.

Learn from my mistakes: always crack each individual egg into a ramekin before adding it to any baking mixture. You’ll have a chance to remove any bits of shell, and in case your eggs have spoiled, you won’t contaminate your entire mixture.

Congratulations. You have just made pâte à choux. Be sure to brag about it on social media.

Transfer pâte à choux to a pastry bag fitted with a plain wide tip.

Pipe puffs into spiraled circles to fit in the floured circles 🙄 about 2 inches apart.

You may need a hand massage when you’re finished piping.

More gougères than you can eat in one sitting? Worry not – you can freeze them.

Dividing evenly, sprinkle the crumbled blue cheese in the center of each round, then sprinkle with the chopped nuts.

Make do: I made my own blue cheese crumbles out of a brick of the stuff we had on hand.

Loaded and ready to go

Choose your own ending:

Having a party? Bake, rotating sheets halfway through, until puffs are golden, about 20 minutes.  Serve immediately, as gougères are best eaten warm from the oven.

Not hungry? Freeze gougère-covered cookie sheet for 30 minutes, then pluck off the rounds, placing them in a Ziploc bag.  Store in the freezer while you repeat with remaining cookie sheets.  Keep frozen until ready to bake.  Do not thaw.

Confessions of an imperfect baker:

I own lots of piping tips, but none like the one called for in this recipe. Instead, I used the widest one I could find, which had little teeth.  Sometimes you just gotta tooth it wing it.

Toothed tip. No one will know or care.

Et voilà!

Notes: Not a blue cheese fan?  Got a nut allergy? Omit those offensive ingredients and do this instead:

• After the film forms at the bottom of the pan, stir in 1½ cups grated Gruyère, ¼ cup grated Parmesan cheese, 2 TBS chopped fresh dill, and 2 TBS chopped fresh chives.
• Just before baking or freezing, sprinkle an additional ¼ cup Parmesan over the gougères. (I haven’t tried this Cheese & Herb version, so if you do, let me know how they turn out.)