--- See Michel Roux Jr make croque monsieur in Michel Roux's French Country Kitchen available now. Look for Guillaume Brahimi in Plat du Tour in July and his new show, Guillaume in Paris, later this year. ---
Talk to Guillaume Brahimi about croque monsieur and you’ll quickly have the urge to fill your own kitchen with the inviting aroma of melting cheese and toasted bread*.
It’s a smell that takes the French-Australian chef back to his childhood, growing up on the outskirts of Paris.
“The first time I had a croque monsieur, it was when my parents used to go out. I was a very young boy. And my mum used to make us a croque monsieur. That was a quick dinner before they could go out for dinner themselves. And I used to love it: Everything I love - cheese, ham and bread.
“For me, smell is so important, and I can remember that smell in the kitchen … I used to love smelling the cheese melting and going 'ah'. My mum used to do them in the pan, and the cheese was starting to melt, and the whole kitchen used to smell of that.”
Croque monsieur is, in one way, very simple: a ham and cheese sandwich, either baked or pan-fried, usually with a layer of melted cheese on the top.
Guillaume Brahimi with croque monsieur Source: SBS Food / Plat du Tour
But when good ingredients come together, it becomes, as chef Michel Roux Jr says, “simply heaven”.
It’s one of the dishes he makes in his series Michel Roux’s French Country Cooking, where he proclaims it his favourite snack in France.
The series sees Roux travelling the south of France, where he often spends holidays, and sharing the kind of food he likes to eat. He’s genuinely excited and enthusiastic about the produce he discovers and the food he cooks, including the classic croque monsieur. 
“I love a croque monsieur and its little cousin 'Le Jambon-Beurre'! It's not just a snack, it can be a great meal, in fact at any time of the day,” he says, when SBS Food chats to the French-English chef, author and TV host.
Michel Roux Jr with his croque monsieur Source: Outline Productions / All3 Media
So what does he see as the key to an excellent ‘croque’?
“Everything has to be just right. Quality bread, good butter, succulent ham, tangy cheese, creamy bechamel with a kick of nutmeg, and, finally, it has to be golden brown from the grill. You simply can't cut corners... or crusts!” he tells us.
Generosity seems to be a key in his croque monsieur too – “proper” thick slices of bread, a "generous" application of mustard, plenty of cheese.
The version Roux makes also uses several layers of bechamel sauce, while Brahimi often makes his without any. Why is that, we asked Brahimi.
Michel Roux Jr's croque monsieur Source: © Outline Productions / All3 Media International
“The classic croque monsieur … most would say it's with bechamel. Pain de mie, you know the soft white bread, and ham and you put as much bechamel as you can around your bread, top with some cheese and bake it in the oven. That's a classic croque monsieur. And after that, some people will put an egg on top of it, a pan-fried egg, and you call it a croque madame," he explains.
“My mum didn't make a bechamel. My mum made a very simple, as we say in Australia, ham and cheese toastie! But you know what? It was delicious.”
A croque madame is topped with a fried egg. Source: Mary Makes It Easy
“If you decide to make the traditional one with sauce bechamel, you want to make sure you do it in advance because when you when you add your bechamel to your bread, it's better to have put it in the fridge for a few hours so the bechamel sets.”
There’s no bechamel in the Brahimi shared some years ago in French Food Safari, a creation he describes as “a serious sandwich”. The jamon makes a rich croque, he explains – “more cocktail party style: you cut the toastie into small batons, like fingers”.
For what we are not sure we should call an ‘everyday’ croque – because there’s really something sublime about even the simplest croque monsieur – he recommends a good ham off the bone, paired with sourdough bread and a cheese like Gruyere, Beaufort or his current favourite, comté.
Guillaume Brahimi's jamon croque monsieur Source: French Food Safari
“I just came back from France, filming my show for SBS, and I love the comté. The comté, you know, it's an alp cheese like gruyere or Beaufort and I ate a lot of comté the last few weeks, so that's why I'm thinking about comté!
“These three cheeses, Gruyere, comté and Beaufort, they've got a beautiful nutty flavour. You don't want to use average cheese, you want to use a proper cheese.”
“And I love using sourdough - if you have a beautiful sourdough left from the day before, it's perfect to make your croque monsieur.”
“After that, you can add some jalapeno if you want, you can put some mustard if you want, you know the creativity can go on and on. But the most important thing is you cook it with love. It doesn't matter if it's jamon and comté or just ham from the bone and some cheese, it's delicious. I don't know anyone who makes a version of croque monsieur, and he's not excited about it - you make your croque monsieur because you want some melted cheese and some toasted bread, right?”
Bread, cheese, ham, generosity and love. Sounds like a recipe for a truly excellent French sandwich.
See Guillaume Brahimi in Plat du Tour from Friday 1 July, as part of SBS’s coverage of the Tour de France (the two previous seasons of Plat du Tour are streaming d, and you can find all the recipes, including a smoked salmon croque monsieur, ). His brand new show, Guillaume in Paris, will also be screened later this year. Get his jamon croque monsieur recipe here. from Michel Roux is very similar to the one he makes in French Country Cooking.
*Truth. The writer did actually halt work on the story to go and make a toasted ham and cheese sandwich.
