Hungarian Smoked Cheese Gourgères.

As well as the little wooden puli dog that I ADORE, one of the things I brought back with me from Hungary was a few packets of smoked cheese called Karavan. Reka’s mum, on our arrival at the flat had laid out a magnificent spread of meats, cheeses and salads but the clear favourite was a pyramid of cheesy puffs. We went wild for them and crammed them in pretty much every minute we were awake until sadly, we scoffed them all.

I couldn’t wait for the recipe when we got home, so instead trawled the internet looking up these bad boys. Figuring out that they were a gougère, which is essentially a cheesy version of a choux bun, I set about experimenting a day after I got back and made these guys. It’s based on a recipe I found online called “Cheddar Cheese Puffs” by Elise Bauer, but I’ve Hungarian-ed it up a bit.

Ingredients:

100g butter

1 cup water

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 cup plain flour

4 eggs

200g roughly grated smoked cheese (reserve 50g for sprinkling on top)

1 teaspoon thyme or marjoram

1 teaspoon smoked paprika

Freshly ground pepper.

Method:

1)      As we’re making a choux pastry here, on a low heat, melt the butter water together in a pan until the water comes to the boil.

2)      Take the pan off the heat and add the salt, then the flour, stirring briskly to avoid any lumps. What you’ll end up with is a big, hot ball of dough. Return it to the heat for a few minutes, until a skin begins to form on the bottom of the pan (this prevents the choux pastry from becoming soggy, but is also hell to clean, so your choice!).

3)      Take the pan off the heat and allow to cool for a few minutes. Beat in the eggs, one by one until you have a looser, glossy paste. Add your 150g of grated cheese, the thyme, paprika and a good scrunch of black pepper.

4)      Dollop rocky heaped teaspoons of the mixture onto prepared baking trays and back in a hot oven, 200˚C for 15-20 minutes. You know they’re done when the bottoms are a lovely dark brown.

We served these warm with a goulash, but they’re also addictive when cold and on their own. I later made these with gluten free flour so Dad-y could eat them, and they worked perfectly too! Phew!