No. 758

Straws Cheese Garnishing

Garniture de Pailles au Fromage

Prepare seven ounces of flour, four ounces of butter, and four ounces of grated cheese, four tablespoonfuls of raw cream, two egg-yolks, a dash of cayenne, and a grain of salt. First rub well between the two hands, the butter and flour, so as to have them sandy; then lay this in a ring on the table, and into the center pour the cream, egg-yolks, cheese, pepper, and salt; make the dough using for this purpose the blade of a knife so as not to heat the paste, and when well mingled, roll it out into a square piece the thickness of one-eighth of an inch. Cut this into bands two and three-quarter inches wide, and cut these again across into ribbons as wide as their thickness; roll them with the hands on the floured table to give each one a round shape, then range them at once on to a buttered baking sheet, clip off their ends together so as to have them all of equal length, and egg the surfaces. Cook these straws for seven or eight minutes in a slack oven, then take them out and detach them from the sheet with the blade of a knife, and return them at once to the oven to finish cooking, a few minutes being sufficient for this purpose. Serve them on folded napkins.

← No. 757 Spinal Marrow Garnishing Garnishings No. 759 Small Swiss Cheese Souffle Garnishing →

For the Modern Kitchen

A straightforward cheese pastry, but Ranhofer's proportions are by weight and his oven is vague. A few notes make it repeatable.

Weights in cupsSeven ounces of flour is about 1 1/2 to 1 3/4 cups; four ounces of butter is one US stick; four ounces of grated cheese is roughly a cup or a little more, loosely packed. Weighing is more reliable here, since the dough is stiff and small errors show.
The cheeseRanhofer does not specify a variety; a dry grating cheese such as Parmesan or a firm Gruyere suits this dough. A moist cheddar adds water and fat and the straws will spread and slump. Grate it fine so the dough cuts cleanly.
"Raw cream"Cream that has not been cooked or scalded. Ordinary heavy cream is the practical equivalent. Four tablespoonfuls is 1/4 cup.
A slack ovenAround 300 to 325F. The point is to set the straws without browning them fast, which is why he pulls them out, frees them from the sheet, and returns them to finish.
Keep the paste coldThis is the hinge. The knife-blade mixing is not fussiness: worked with warm hands, the butter melts into the flour, the straws toughen and the cheese weeps fat. Chill the dough if the kitchen is warm and chill the cut straws before baking.
CuttingAn eighth of an inch thick, cut into ribbons as wide as they are thick, gives a square section about 1/8 inch on a side, then rolled round. Modern practice more often leaves them flat and twisted; rolling them round is what makes them read as straws.
The double bakeLoosening them at seven or eight minutes prevents the underside sticking as they crisp. Ranhofer's own timing gives a total of about ten to thirteen minutes; take them out when pale gold, not brown, as cheese burns bitter.
Yield and keepingThey stale quickly; bake the day they are served, or recrisp briefly in a low oven.

A Little History

Cheese straws belong to the late nineteenth-century service of savouries and garnishings rather than to the cheese course proper. Ranhofer, who ran the kitchen at Delmonico's in New York and published The Epicurean in 1894, files them under garnishings because that is how they were used: served on a folded napkin beside a soup, a salad, or a savoury, as much a piece of table architecture as a mouthful. The technique itself is a cheese-enriched short paste worked cold with a knife, the same discipline French pastry cooks applied to pate brisee, and the English versions of the period, often called cheese biscuits or cheese fingers, are close relatives of the same idea.