Eat Cheap, Eat Well, Eat Up!

Mook's Cheese Straws, made in Alabama, are the real thing.

I just cruised over to Chef Eric Ripert’s delightlful blog, Avec Eric.  Like many, I’m seduced by his adorable prematurely gray hair, his Gallic charm, his kid-in-a-candy-store enthusiasm, his sexy accent, his way with food…let me count the ways. “The holidays are an excellent time for a cocktail,” he begins in his current post. Yes, Eric, they are, especially if you’re doing the cooking.

I scrolled through an intriguing roll call of recipes that offer Eric’s interpretation of classic American cocktail fare–chorizo-stuffed shrimp, deviled eggs with smoked salmon, and the like. Then my eyes fell on his Spicy Parmesan Cheese Straws. I clicked on the recipe to check out his spin on the iconic Southern snack. Now, I’ve been living in the Deep South for awhile, long enough to appreciate the simple, decadent pleasure of a good cheese straw. Especially when it’s served with a gin and tonic.  I’ve got a friend who regularly churns out his cheese straws, and they’re so good that I always say he should sell them. 

What Eric offers is. not. a. cheese. straw. His recipe features puff pastry (huh???) cut into strips and coated in a blend of parmesan cheese, chopped pistachios, salt, and cayenne pepper. Delicious, I’m sure. If you served me one but didn’t call it a cheese straw, I’d probably love it. Maybe it’s the language barrier, but semantics count here, and these are by no stretch true cheese straws.

A real cheese straw is a simple decadent please, little more than loads of cheese, butter, and flour. No puff pastry involved.

The real thing is cheese (often cheddar, and lots of it) and butter (lots of it) bound by flour with salt and pepper (could be cayenne), and extruded into their straw shape with a cookie press or pastry bag. Cooks may play with the proportions, the type of cheese, perhaps add herbs. (I once suggested a friend’s college-age daughter bring pot-spiked cheese straws to the family Thanksgiving. Hmm, perhaps that’s why it’s a good idea I’m no one’s parent. But I stand by the concept as a solid one.)

But there is no puff pastry in a cheese straw. Sorry, Eric.

You can buy plenty of classic, packaged cheese straws, even if you’re not in the South. Mook’s, of Florence, Alabama, makes a good one. For a classic rendition, I suggest you try Southern Living’s Cheddar Cheese Straws. They’d be great with a gin and tonic.