This is
something different.
First of all,
pardon my long silence. There are numerous excuses that I could provide, but
that would be tiresome. The most honest thing that I could say is that I’ve
been in a period of hibernation; mulling over various things, doing a lot of
reading, and something else too—making art again. Maybe I’ve never mentioned it
here, but that was something that I used to do a lot of.
And, well, after
forsaking it entirely upon finishing my MFA degree, it has come back,
full-speed ahead. I woke up one morning and it hit me over the head in the form
of a cyclone of new ideas and a renewed urgency that I haven’t felt in
years—“go do this now,” it seemed to whisper to me. I abided.
As I try to
bring all of these parts of myself together into something called a “life,”
certain things have moved to the wayside, at least temporarily. I’m beginning
to pull the various, seemingly disparate pieces back together now I think,
making room for both new and old as I go.
In the midst of
this crisis/artistic revival, however, I did do one notable culinary thing—the
only thing, perhaps, worth telling you about (I take it you don’t want to hear
about the tuna fish sandwiches I sometimes made for dinner, or the quick pastas
and hasty salads that I threw together while I was busy doing other things,
right? No, neither do I).
The one event
that I could mark my culinary calendar by went something like this: a pâte à
choux, flecked with thyme, speckled with black pepper, and oozing with melted
gruyère; an intrigued orange cat who kept me company on the chair next to the
table as I worked; and a restless roommate, sporting nothing but a towel,
saying wistfully, as he hovered over me, are they done yet?!
Gougères. That’s
what they were. They
weren’t done yet; and this despondent roommate had to wait several hours until
he came back home later that evening to try one.
I, on the other
hand, picked one up steaming from the oven, tore it open with celebratory glee,
and consumed the hot, steaming roll in a rush of hunger and passion—burning the
roof of my mouth slightly as I went. Sexy. (Also, stupid.)
*
Gougères live,
in my mind, at a café on the corner of 18th and Guerrero in San Francisco. If
you can stomach the line that wraps around the block in the mornings (I usually
can’t), you can find yourself in the company of flaky croissants, quivering
bread pudding, sticky and fragrant morning buns, and rows of slick, shimmering
cakes and cookies. Past the case (if you make it this far) is, in my mind,
where the true treasures lie—the savory things: gougères, and cake aux olives,
flaky quiche with crème fraîche and swiss chard, and croque monsieurs piled
high with baby shiitake mushrooms and creamy béchamel.
I both love and
hate this café.
But gougères… I
ache a little when I go too long without one. And it turns out that they are
easy enough to make at home. So easy, in fact, that you will be surprised that
you haven’t attempted it before.
I have tended to
feel like any bread-like thing
that one could possibly make would be incredibly arduous and time-consuming:
all of that rising and punching and kneading that I’ve seen countless bakers
do. The careful prodding and feeding of the “starter”—a strange, amorphous little
creature that is somehow “alive” and somehow responsible for any good crusty,
moderately sour bread.
But gougères are
different—they are not really a bread at all in the traditional sense; they
require no yeast, no rising, no amorphous “starter” waiting to pass out in your
fridge if it is in the least bit neglected by you.
They are very
simply composed of an egg-based dough, whisked together on the stovetop, to
which grated gruyère, thyme, and an incredible amount of black pepper is added
in the last moments.
Easy.
Also, delicious
and warming. The result is, as Elisabeth Prueitt puts it “…the perfect
combination of a crusty, caramelized outside and a soft, eggy inside.” Yes, indeed.
These are best
taken with a glass of rosé and a small dish of olives; all the better if there
is a crackling fire raging just beyond your toes.
Gougères
Adapted from Tartine
A couple of
notes: I do everything by hand (mostly because I lack the proper equipment),
but this recipe could also be done using a stand mixer fitted with a paddle
attachment; it will make the slow incorporation of the eggs, which must go in
one by one, much, much easier. Also, the original recipe adamantly declares
that nonfat milk must
be used (do not replace with 2% or whole milk)—it’s something to do with all of
that fat from the 10 tablespoons of butter that you need to make these delicate
little rolls.
For the
pâte à choux:
1¼ cups nonfat
milk
10 tablespoons
unsalted butter
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup flour
5 eggs
¾ cups grated gruyère
cheese
1 teaspoon
freshly ground black pepper
1 tablespoon
fresh thyme, chopped
For the
topping:
1 egg, beaten
with a pinch of salt
Grated gruyère
Preheat oven to
350 degrees. Line a baking sheet with parchment.
Combine the
milk, butter, and salt in a medium-sized saucepan, and place over medium heat.
Allow the butter to melt, and bring the mixture to a full boil. Once this
occurs, add the flour, all in one shot, and stir quickly until the mixture
forms a smooth mass and pulls away from the sides of the pan (1-3 minutes).
This is your
simple choux paste.
Transfer it to a
medium bowl, and add the eggs, one by one, incorporating each egg completely
before cracking in the next. When all the eggs have been incorporated, mix in
the gruyère, thyme, and black pepper with a rubber spatula.
Using a large
spoon, drop the batter onto the prepared baking sheet into 3-inch mounds,
roughly 1½ inches high. They should be spaced approximately 2 inches apart.
Brush the beaten
egg onto the tops of each pastry (smoothing out the surfaces of the gougères slightly as you do this) and sprinkle
with gruyère cheese.
Bake for 35-45
minutes, or until the gougères
have puffed up and are nicely browned.
Remove from the
oven and poke a hole in the side of each gougère to release the steam and prevent them
from collapsing.
They are
delicious consumed warm, and also very good the next day.
