French Cheese Puffs aka Gougères aka Pâte à Choux | Making Life Delicious

French Cheese Puffs aka Gougères aka Pâte à Choux | Making Life Delicious: "Cheese Gougères
Adapted from a recipe by David Leibovitz

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* 1 cup (250ml) water
* 6 tablespoons (80g) unsalted butter
* 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
* large pinch of cayenne pepper
* 1 cup (140g) all-purpose flour
* 4 large eggs
* 24 chives, finely-minced (don’t have chives, try scallions)
* 1 1/2 cups (about 6 ounces, 180g) grated cheese like Gruyère (See Note)

NOTE: You can use all sorts of cheese in this recipe. I think that the more sharp or distinctive cheeses work best. You can also use a cheese blend. For instance, a little parmesan cheese in place of some of the gruyère would also be very yummy. Sharp cheddar, aged gouda or any number of other intensely flavored hard cheeses would work really well.

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees F. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.

Heat the water, butter, salt, and cayenne in a saucepan until the butter is melted, don’t let it simmer or boil because you will lose too much water.

Dump in the flour all at once and stir vigorously until the mixture pulls away from the sides into a smooth ball. Remove from heat and let rest two minutes.

Transfer the flour and butter ball to the bowl of a standing mixer. Turn it on and add the eggs, one at a time. The batter will first appear lumpy, but after a minute or so, it will smooth out and become glossy and gorgeous.

Add all the chives and about 75% of the gruyère and stir until well-mixed.

Scrape the mixture into a pastry bag or plastic bag with the corner cut out (that’s what I use). Pipe the dough into mounds, evenly-spaced apart about the size of a rounded tablespoon. Top each puff with a bit of the remaining cheese.

At this point, you could refrigerate the dough on the sheet for several hours before baking. You could also freeze the dough on the sheet and then transfer the frozen mounds to a ziplock bag to store for up to three months.

About half an hour before you want to serve these. Pop them into a hot oven at 425 degrees F for 10 minutes (15 if you are baking from frozen), then turn the oven down to 375 degrees F and bake for an additional 20 minutes. Serve warm.



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