France and the Alps · Volume 16, Altitude, Cheese and a Border the Kitchen Never Drew
Gratin de crozets au Beaufort
Savoie, specifically the Tarentaise valley
An illustration of the dish, not a photograph of it cooked.
- Time
- 40 minutes
- Researched
- 22 sources cited
- Reviewed
- Not yet reviewed from inside the tradition
- Cooked
- Not yet cooked and reported
Savoie, specifically the Tarentaise valley, buckwheat's own crop of choice.
As tradition built it
Serves 4. About 40 minutes.
Ingredients
- 1 packet crozets, plain or buckwheat
- 20 cl crème fraîche
- 150 g Beaufort AOP, grated
Method
- Boil the crozets in plenty of salted water, around 20 minutes.
- Drain and mix with the crème fraîche in a gratin dish.
- Top with the grated Beaufort and bake au gratin until golden.
What a modern chef changes
Home-dried crozets, and a Beaufort-forward béchamel in place of plain cream
Rungs 1 and 5
Method
- Make the crozets from scratch and dry them in a dehydrator held at a controlled 65°C for 24 to 36 hours, following rung 5's own logic directly: this reproduces the slow, sub-70°C traditional drying discipline far more reliably than a domestic oven, and produces a firmer, better-textured pasta than most shop-bought dried crozets.
- Build a light Beaufort béchamel rather than folding in plain crème fraîche, a roux-based sauce finished with the grated cheese melted through gently below 70°C, using the same temperature discipline rung 1 establishes for fondue. This gives a more stable, less likely to split sauce that coats the crozets evenly rather than pooling at the base of the dish.
- Finish with a thin, separate layer of extra-aged Beaufort d'alpage, grated fine, added only for the final two minutes under the grill, so its more complex, longer-aged character survives as a distinct top note rather than melting entirely into the base sauce.