Cheddar & Jalapeño Gougères

The most underrated cheesy treat

I don’t often share savoury recipes but I had to make an exception for these cheesy gougères and since they’re made of choux pastry I feel they fall well within my realm.

At the risk of sounding like the most bourgeois child ever, cheese gougère was one of my favourite things to eat growing up. Don’t ask me how this became a regular household meal, I assure you that not all of my childhood dinners were this fancy, I remember eating a lot of lentil spag bol and tuna pasta, but sometimes I was blessed with a huge ring of golden, crispy, cheesy, eggy deliciousness. I can’t even remember what we ate it with, I think I probably tried eat nothing but gougère on the days that we had it. Since making them recently I’ve just been munching on them for lunch but they’d make lovely canapés filled with cream cheese and smoked salmon or an accompaniment to anything saucy, they’re almost Yorkshire pudding-like in texture and are perfect for soaking up a bit of sauce or gravy.

Rather than making one huge ring like my mum used to, I made mini puffs, they’re so light that you can easily eat ten of them in a row. I wanted these to be a nice stand alone snack and because I’m both a spice and pickle lover I added some pickled jalapeños to this recipe but if you want to keep them more traditional or aren’t a fan of spice you can leave them out.

I use the same base choux pastry recipe that I use for choux buns, this is great because it means you can make a big batch and then split it and have both sweet and savoury treats! The addition of the cheese means that these don’t puff up quite as much as a normal choux pastry but they’re still beautifully light and crisp on the outside with a cheesy slightly eggy centre.

Cheddar & Jalapeño Gougères - makes about 30

140ml water

55g butter

110g strong flour

About 4 medium eggs

1/2 tsp sugar

1 tsp salt

A good grind of black pepper

20g dijon mustard

1/2 tsp smoked paprika

50g cheddar plus more for the tops (you can use any cheese you like)

50g finely chopped pickled jalapeños

Method

1. Place the water, butter, sugar and salt in a pan and bring to the boil.

2. Once boiling, reduce the temperature and add the flour stirring vigorously.

3. Continue to cook for about 2 minutes.

4. Remove from the heat and transfer into a stand mixer, beat with the paddle on slow until it’s cooled, while cooling pre-heat the oven to 170°C.

5. Add the first three eggs one at a time, beating until fully incorporated before adding more egg.

6. The amount of egg you need is dependant on a number of factors so you might need more of less than 4 eggs, the mixture should drop off the spatula to form a V shape but not run off.

7. Add the cheese, seasonings and jalapeños and mix.

8. Mark the tray using a cutter dipped in flour and pipe the choux into small blobs, i marked mine with a 35mm cutter, larger ones will take longer to bake.

9. Top with grated cheese.

10. Bake at 170°C for 20-25 minutes, DO NOT OPEN THE DOOR BEFORE 20 MINUTES!

11. Eat!

This GIF is just piping choux pastry so it's smoother than the gougère mix but you get the idea!