A ''croque monsieur'' () is a hot
sandwich
A sandwich is a food typically consisting of vegetables, sliced cheese or meat, placed on or between slices of bread, or more generally any dish wherein bread serves as a container or wrapper for another food type. The sandwich began as a po ...
made with
ham
Ham is pork from a leg cut that has been preserved by wet or dry curing, with or without smoking."Bacon: Bacon and Ham Curing" in ''Chambers's Encyclopædia''. London: George Newnes, 1961, Vol. 2, p. 39. As a processed meat, the term "ham ...
and
cheese
Cheese is a dairy product produced in wide ranges of flavors, textures, and forms by coagulation of the milk protein casein. It comprises proteins and fat from milk, usually the milk of cows, buffalo, goats, or sheep. During product ...
. The name comes from the French words ''croque'' ("crunch") and ''monsieur'' ("mister").
History
The dish originated in
French café
A coffeehouse, coffee shop, or café is an establishment that primarily serves coffee of various types, notably espresso, latte, and cappuccino. Some coffeehouses may serve cold drinks, such as iced coffee and iced tea, as well as other non-ca ...
s and
bars as a quick snack. In the early 1900s, bistro owner Michel Lunarca popularized the croque-monsieur.
Preparation
A ''croque monsieur'' is traditionally made with baked or boiled ham and sliced cheese between slices of ''
pain de mie'', topped with grated cheese and slightly salted and peppered, and then baked in an oven or fried in a
frying pan
A frying pan, frypan, or skillet is a flat-bottomed pan used for frying, searing, and browning foods. It is typically in diameter with relatively low sides that flare outwards, a long handle, and no lid. Larger pans may have a small grab ha ...
. The bread may optionally be browned by
grilling
Grilling is a form of cooking that involves dry heat applied to the surface of food, commonly from above, below or from the side. Grilling usually involves a significant amount of direct, radiant heat, and tends to be used for cooking meat a ...
after being dipped in beaten egg. Traditionally,
Gruyère is used, but sometimes
Comté or
Emmental
The Emmental ( en, Emme Valley) is a valley in west-central Switzerland, forming part of the canton of Bern. It is a hilly landscape comprising the basins of the rivers Emme and Ilfis. The region is mostly devoted to farming, particularly dai ...
cheese as well. Some
brasserie
In France, Flanders, and the Francophone world, a brasserie () is a type of French restaurant with a relaxed setting, which serves single dishes and other meals. The word ''brasserie'' is also French for "brewery" and, by extension, "the brew ...
s also add
béchamel sauce
Bechamel sauce ( ) is a sauce traditionally made from a white roux (butter and flour in a 1:1 mixture by weight) and milk. Bechamel may also be referred to as besciamella (Italy), besamel (Greece), or white sauce (U.S.). French, Italian and Greek ...
.
''Croque monsieur'' may be baked or fried so that the cheese topping melts and forms a crust.
Variations
A croque monsieur served with a
poached or lightly
fried egg
An egg is an organic vessel grown by an animal to carry a possibly fertilized egg cell (a zygote) and to incubate from it an embryo within the egg until the embryo has become an animal fetus that can survive on its own, at which point the a ...
on top is known as a ''croque madame'' (or, in parts of
Normandy
Normandy (; french: link=no, Normandie ; nrf, Normaundie, Nouormandie ; from Old French , plural of ''Normant'', originally from the word for "northman" in several Scandinavian languages) is a geographical and cultural region in Northwestern ...
, as a ''croque-à-cheval''). According to the ''
Petit Robert
''Le Petit Robert de la Langue Française'' (), known as just ''Petit Robert'', is a popular single-volume French dictionary first published by Paul Robert in 1967. It is an abridgement of his eight-volume ''Dictionnaire alphabétique et analog ...
'' dictionary, the name dates to around 1960. The name ''croque-mademoiselle'' is associated with its lighter, vegetarian version: made of the same bread, but with ordinary melting cheese, accompanied with
chives
Chives, scientific name ''Allium schoenoprasum'', is a species of flowering plant in the family Amaryllidaceae that produces edible leaves and flowers. Their close relatives include the common onions, garlic, shallot, leek, scallion, and ...
,
cucumber
Cucumber (''Cucumis sativus'') is a widely-cultivated creeping vine plant in the Cucurbitaceae family that bears usually cylindrical fruits, which are used as culinary vegetables.[lettuce
Lettuce (''Lactuca sativa'') is an annual plant of the family Asteraceae. It is most often grown as a leaf vegetable, but sometimes for its stem and seeds. Lettuce is most often used for salads, although it is also seen in other kinds of foo ...]
.
[
In the ]United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the European mainland, continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...
, a ham-and-cheese hot snack is called a ''toastie'', and toastie makers are available to buy. In the United States, the Monte Cristo, a ham-and-cheese sandwich, often dipped in egg and fried, is popular diner fare, and a 'grilled cheese sandwich' is a classic sandwich that has been enjoyed at home and in cafeteria-style restaurants since the Great Depression.Porto
Porto or Oporto () is the second-largest city in Portugal, the capital of the Porto District, and one of the Iberian Peninsula's major urban areas. Porto city proper, which is the entire municipality of Porto, is small compared to its metropo ...
, called "Francesinha".
See also
* Welsh rarebit
Welsh rarebit or Welsh rabbit ( or ) is a dish consisting of a hot cheese-based sauce served over slices of toasted bread. The original 18th-century name of the dish was the jocular "Welsh rabbit", which was later reinterpreted as "rarebit", ...
* Grilled cheese sandwich
A grilled cheese (sometimes known as a toasted sandwich or cheese toastie) is a hot sandwich typically prepared by heating one or more slices of cheese between slices of bread, with a cooking fat such as butter, on a frying pan, griddle, or sandw ...
* Ham and cheese sandwich
* Ham and egg bun
* Monte Cristo sandwich
* Francesinha
Francesinha ( meaning ''Frenchie'') is a Portuguese sandwich originally from Porto, made with bread, wet-cured ham, linguiça, fresh sausage like chipolata, steak or roast meat, and covered with melted cheese and a hot and thick spiced tomato an ...
* Strammer Max
''Strammer Max'' (English: roughly "Strapping Max") is a traditional name applied to various sandwich dishes in German cuisine.
German dish
The original is a slice of bread, sometimes fried in butter, covered with ham and fried egg. The ham ma ...
* Toastie
A pie iron—also called pudgy pie iron, sandwich toaster, snackwicher, toastie maker, that consists of two hinged concave, round or square, cast iron or aluminium plates on long handles. Its "clamshell" design resembles that of a waffle ...
* List of ham dishes
This is a list of notable ham dishes. Ham is pork that has been preserved through salting, smoking, or wet curing. It was traditionally made only from the hind leg of swine, and referred to that specific cut of pork."Bacon: Bacon and Ham Cur ...
* List of sandwiches
A ''list'' is any set of items in a row. List or lists may also refer to:
People
* List (surname)
Organizations
* List College, an undergraduate division of the Jewish Theological Seminary of America
* SC Germania List, German rugby uni ...
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Croque-Monsieur
French sandwiches
French cuisine
Ham dishes
Cheese sandwiches
Pork sandwiches