Croquetas de Jamón
The most Spanish of bar snacks: a stiff béchamel studded with chopped serrano ham, chilled until firm, then breadcrumbed and deep-fried into golden ovals with a creamy molten centre. Long process; addictive result.
Overview
A thick béchamel, three times the flour-to-milk ratio of standard béchamel, is studded with chopped jamón serrano, chilled until firm enough to shape, rolled into ovals, breaded with flour-egg-panko, and deep-fried at 180°C until deep golden. Eat hot.
Ingredients
Filling
- 100 g unsalted butter
- 1 onion (small, very finely chopped)
- 100 g jamón serrano (or prosciutto), finely chopped
- 100 g plain flour
- 700 ml whole milk (warm)
- A grating of nutmeg
- salt
- pepper
Breading and frying
- 100 g plain flour
- 3 eggs (large, beaten)
- 200 g panko breadcrumbs
- Vegetable oil for deep-frying
Method
Stage 1 - Béchamel base
- Melt the butter in a heavy pan over medium heat.
- Cook the onion gently for 8 minutes until soft and almost translucent (don't colour).
- Add the chopped ham; cook 1 minute.
- Sprinkle in the flour all at once and stir vigorously for 2 minutes (this is a thick roux; cook the raw flour out).
- Pour in the warm milk in steady streams, whisking constantly to avoid lumps.
- Continue whisking over medium heat for 8-10 minutes until the mixture is very thick and pulls away from the sides of the pan.
- Season with nutmeg, salt and pepper.
Stage 2 - Chill
- Tip the mixture into a tray lined with cling film, spread to about 1 ½ cm thick.
- Cover with cling film pressed onto the surface (no skin forms).
- Refrigerate at least 4 hours, ideally overnight.
Stage 3 - Shape
- Scoop heaped dessert-spoonfuls of the chilled mixture and roll into ovals (3 cm long) on a lightly floured surface.
- Set on a tray as you go.
Stage 4 - Bread
- Set up three plates: flour, egg, panko.
- Roll each croqueta in flour, dip in egg, then panko. Re-coat in egg and panko for a thicker crust if you like.
Stage 5 - Fry
- Heat oil to 180°C in a deep pan.
- Fry the croquetas in batches for 2-3 minutes until deep golden.
- Drain on a wire rack; eat hot.
Notes
- Chill thoroughly: Warm filling is impossible to shape. Overnight is best.
- Thick béchamel is non-negotiable: Standard 5:5:50 (flour:butter:milk) flows. Croqueta béchamel is more like 7:7:50 - much stiffer.
- Panko gives more crunch: Traditional fine breadcrumbs work but panko stays crisper after frying.
Storage
- Best fresh. Shaped raw croquetas freeze well 2 months - fry from frozen, adding 1 minute.
- Cooked keep 1 day refrigerated; reheat at 180°C for 6 minutes.
More like this
Spanish Omelette (Tortilla)
This classic Spanish omelette is a rustic, hearty dish featuring tender potatoes, caramelized onions, peppers, tomatoes, and spiced chorizo bound together with fluffy beaten eggs. The omelette is cooked slowly and gently, allowing the ingredients to meld while maintaining a creamy centre with a lightly golden exterior. Tortilla española is equally delicious served warm, at room temperature, or cold, making it versatile for any meal of the day.
Beef Wellington
The defining British dinner-party showpiece, somewhere between French haute cuisine and English roast tradition, made famous in the modern era by Gordon Ramsay even if the Iron Duke himself probably never ate it. You sear a centre-cut beef fillet hard for colour, smear it with English mustard, wrap it in a tight blanket of mushroom duxelles and prosciutto, then encase the lot in all-butter puff pastry and roast at high heat. The pastry insulates the beef so it cooks gently to medium-rare while the crust crisps to deep mahogany above. The one technical trick the recipe insists on is drying the duxelles thoroughly so the pastry stays crisp underneath rather than going soggy from leaking mushroom water. Sliced at the table into thick rosy rounds, with a red-wine jus and roasted root vegetables on the side, the kind of plate that makes the evening feel like a special occasion before anyone says it.
Ragù with Gnocchi
This ragù blends deep browning, layered aromatics, and a long, gentle oven braise to create a sauce with rich umami, silky texture, and balanced brightness. A two-milk finish adds softness, while a quick red wine gastrique lifts the sauce at the end.
Roujiamo (Xi'an Chinese Hamburger)
Roujiamo is often, lazily, called the Chinese hamburger, but it is older than the burger by perhaps a thousand years and structurally quite different. The bread is a flat, lightly leavened, sometimes laminated wheat round, with the layered Tongguan style (flaky and croissant-like) considered superior to the softer baijimo. The filling is rich braised pork, shoulder or belly, simmered with rock sugar, soy and warming spice until it shreds under a knife, then chopped fine on a board with raw onion and cilantro and a spoonful of its own dark cooking liquid. The whole assembly is then crammed inside the freshly fried-and-baked bun while everything is still hot. Roujiamo is a quintessentially Xi'an dish, the product of a city that for centuries sat at the eastern terminus of the Silk Road; the bread tradition comes from the Hui and Uyghur Muslim communities of the northwest, while the braised pork belongs to the Han Chinese kitchen. Difficulty for a home cook is moderate to high, the lamination of the bread takes practice, and there are multiple components on timed tracks, but the result is one of the great street foods of China, and the buns and meat can both be made ahead.