Croquants

Name: Croquants
Yield: makes 60 cookies
Ingredients: 1 cup (200 g) sugar; 5 1/2 tablespoons (50 g) all-purpose flour; 1/4 cup (60 ml) egg whites (about 2 large egg whites); Pinch of salt; 3/4 cup (90 g) almonds or hazelnuts, toasted and very coarsely chopped (see Tip)

December 9, 2011

This recipe is the result of a 12-year obsession. I first fell for these wispy cookies when I bought a startlingly pricey pack of them at an upscale gourmet store in America. When I moved to France, I was surprised how common these crackly cookies are. I was so excited—they were everywhere! Have I mentioned that I’m obsessive? It shouldn’t come as a surprise, then, that I just had to come up with a recipe for the cookies myself. I checked the ingredients list on as many packages as I could get my hands on, and they certainly seemed simple enough. What followed was years of duds as I searched for ways to combine the mere handful of ingredients into the lightly caramelized croquants of my dreams. Then, suddenly, one day, after a lot of trial and just as much error, I got it right. I wasn’t the only one pleased with the results: I left a sack for the highly opinionated French woman who cleans my apartment, and arrived home later to find a little note that read “EXTRA DELICIEUX. Merci, David!”

Recipe notes

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