Spring Appetizer: Herb or Cheese Gougères

Last week we threw out a weekend challenge: make pâte à choux. This fancy-sounding dough is actually a simple paste of eggs, flour, and butter, and when you mix in a few herbs, you get addictive, crispy little appetizers like these gougères.

These little herb and butter puffs are so easy; you can make them way ahead, too. Most gougère recipes say you can make them ahead and store them for up to a week in an airtight container or freeze them. Then just re-crisp in a hot oven.

The recipe pictured above is from Martha Stewart, and it includes lemon and parsley, but we also like this recipe for Blue Cheese Gougères from Epicurious.

Get the recipe: Lemon-Parsley Gougères at Martha Stewart

(Image: Martha Stewart)

Comments (8)

Hilarious, I just got on the computer to print out Dorie's recipe for gougeres when this popped up. It's a sign!

posted by Squirrely on April 9th 2009 at 3:00pm
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smitten kitchen also has a recipe, though i don't feel like searching her archives at the moment. perhaps someone else is more ambitious?

posted by roseslaw on April 9th 2009 at 3:40pm
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I am seeing recipes and articles on gougeres all over the place the last couple of weeks so have decided that this will be the weekend that I attempt my own. I am very excited.

posted by rosebud on April 9th 2009 at 3:52pm
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http://smittenkitchen.com/2006/12/just-a-few-bites/
She actually just linked to them in her recent post on crostini, so I didn't have to dig. : )

Question - should they be a little moist inside or totally dry?

posted by Squirrely on April 9th 2009 at 5:24pm
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the ones in the photo don't look quite right. a gougere is a savory (small) cream puff. it should be hollow, but moist. you can also pipe them out, freeze them, transfer to a ziploc bag and bake them off when you need them. i think they taste better than re-crisping in the oven.

posted by saltyc on April 9th 2009 at 7:55pm
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oh, and gougeres always have cheese in the choux paste.

posted by saltyc on April 9th 2009 at 7:57pm
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Over at Anticiplate, Kari posted some good looking little gougere mini-sandwiches filled with arugula, bacon, and pickled onions....yum!

http://www.anticiplate.com/anticiplate/gougeres-with-arugula-bacon-and-pickled-onions/

posted by maggie (p/c) on April 9th 2009 at 8:04pm
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The last time I made gougeres (last month, I think), I used David Lebovitz's recipe, and they turned out awesome! I really like his extra tips and pictures.

posted by squidlette on April 9th 2009 at 11:45pm
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