Croque Madame

Could there be a better brunch?!?

It's the last day of summer. Start your diet tomorrow. You deserve to have the summer go out with a bang. It's not traditional summer BBQ food, but I was inspired by the Sept Gourmet magazine cover - Paris, France. I've always wanted to try and Vegetarianize! a Croque Madame sandwich. "Ham," gruyere cheese, bechamel sauce, crusty bread - all melty together...what could be better - and all with a fried egg on top! In case you don't know that topper, the fried egg, is the difference between a Croque Monsieur and a Croque Madame. So much more lady-like with an egg, and once you put an egg on anything and serve it with sparkling wine - it's brunch!

I must also give a plug to the Village Bakery here in Davis. I started to make some of my homemade wheat bread when I realized that in the 3:35 hours it was going to take to make, we'd be eating each other. So after our run around the arboretum to work up our appetites, we stopped by the Co-op to pick up some bread. There just happened to be a man with a Village Bakery shirt on there shopping with his daughter. Well, long story short, he and his daughter sold us on the Levain - a crusty, wide loaf that was perfectly chewy and holy inside. Wish I got that man's name to thank him for the recommendation...

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Croque Madame
Adapted from a recipe in Gourmet October 2002

Servings: 2

Time: 40 min active and total

Type: Vegetarian; sorry, vegans, I know I've been making a lot of stuff with eggs and cheese! This is the foundation of why I can't be a vegan...

Price: $11.25 total; $5.63 per serving

Nutrition (per serving): just close your eyes!

Calories: 720.07

Protein: 52.67g

Fat: 37.12g

Saturated Fat: 15.92g

Cholesterol: 279.44mg

Sodium: 1,608.46mg

Carbohydrates: 42.66g

Fiber: 1.17g

1 Tbsp butter, as usual I used vegan butter

1 Tbsp white flour

3/4 cup milk, as usual I used plain soy milk

1/4 tsp SnP and ground nutmeg, each

4 oz gruyere, grated

2 Tbsp parmesan, grated

4 thick slices of French or Italian loaf, I used levain

6 oz sliced, smoked "ham," I used Lightlife

Dijon mustard

2 large eggs, fried sunny side up

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

2. Melt butter in small saucepan on med-low heat. Add flour and cook, whisking until smooth, about 2-3 min.

Add milk, slowly, and whisk continuously until thick - about 5 min. Do not allow to boil. Remove from heat. Add SnP and nutmeg. Stir in Parm and 1/4 cup of gruyere. Set aside to melt.

3. Lay out bread slices on cooking spray covered baking sheet covered with foil.

Spread with a bit of butter and toast them in the oven a few minutes.

4. Remove from the oven after toasting and leave them on the baking sheet. Lightly brush each slice with Dijon mustard. Add ham slices and 1/2 the remaining gruyere, split among the four slices of bread. Put the slices together to make the sandwich.

5. Spoon the cheese sauce (called bechamel) to the top of the sandwiches. Sprinkle with the remaining gruyere. Bake in the oven for 5 min then turn on boiler and broil for an additional 3-5 min until cheese if bubbly and slightly brown.

6. While bread is toasting, put a pat of butter in a small skillet. When melted, crack one egg on each side of the pan and fry gently on medium low heat while you assemble the sandwiches. Do not turn the egg. When sandwiches are broiled and cheese has melted, top each sandwich with one fried egg. The yolk will be soft and ooze over the cheesy sandwich as it eat it - bon appetit!