How to Cook Croque Monsieur
Makes: 4 sandiwiches
Preparation time: 20 mins
Cooking time: 15 mins
Ingredients needed to make Croque Monsieur:
- 8 slices French loaf bread
- ¼ cup Parmesan cheese, grated
- 12 oz ham, sliced
- 6 oz Gruyere cheese, grated
- 1 ½ cups milk
- 2 tbsp all purpose flour
- Dash of grated nutmeg
- Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste
- 2 tbsp butter, softened
Cooking instructions for Croque Monsieur:
- Prepare your oven by preheating it to 400 degrees F.
- To make the bechamel sauce, add a dollop of butter in a small-sized saucepan and heat over moderately low heat until it melts and becomes foamy.
- Dust the flour on it and cook for a couple of minutes, while stirring continuously.
- Pour the milk in a continuous stream and cook, while whisking it rigorously till it thickens.
- Remove the sauce from heat and sprinkle a dash of nutmeg over it.
- Season with salt and freshly ground black pepper as necessary and top it up with grated Parmesan and ¼ cup of the grated Gruyere cheese; keep it aside to cool.
- Arrange the bread slices on a baking sheet and put it in the oven.
- Toast the slices lightly for a couple of minutes before flipping it over and toasting the other side similarly.
- You can butter either side of the bread slices prior to toasting to add more flavours.
- Spread some mustard on half of the toasted breads and arrange slices of ham on each of them.
- Top it up with 1 cup of the Gruyere cheese and place the other half of the toasted bread slices over them.
- Drizzle the bechamel sauce generously over the sandwiches and sprinkle rest of Gruyere cheese on the slices.
- Arrange them in a broiling pan and bake at the preheated temperature for about 5 minutes. They can be also grilled in the skillet instead of baking in the oven.
- Set the oven to broil mode and broil the sandwiches for another 3-5 minutes.
- Once the cheese topping melts, gives out bubbles and turns golden brown, remove from oven and allow to cool to room temperature.
- Serve and chomp away!
- You can turn croque monsieur into croque madame by topping up each sandwiches with a fried egg.
Image Credit: Wikimedia Commons
