So today I made pão de queijo for some Canadian friends, one of whom is married to a Brazilian girl from Minas and who had had it in Brazil.

It turned out so well I have to share the recipe:

Ingredients

250g tapioca startch (aka tapioca flour)

50ml vegetable oil (I used grapeseed oil but any vegetable oil such as canola or sunflower would do)

150ml milk

2 eggs

250g parmesan cheese

Instructions

1. Boil the oil and milk (watch it so it doesn’t boil over)

2. Add the tapioca startch to a large bowl and mix in the hot oil&milk. Don’t worry if it doesn’t mix well and it forms lumps. It will look rather dry.

3. Let the mixture cool a bit. Once cool to touch, add the eggs and mix well.

4. Add the cheese (I added half and add more a little bit at a time; I ended up using about 200g rather than the full 250g)

5. Now the hard part: kneed the mixture by hand until you get a uniform, smooth dough that unsticks from your hand. If it’s too sticky even after mixing it for a while, add a bit more startch.

6. Make the little balls (mine were about 1-2 inches) and bake them for about 20 mins at 400F

These freeze incredibly well. Just make the balls, put them on a baking sheet lined with wax paper and place them in the freezer. Once frozen, remove them from the baking sheet and put them in a ziplock bag. When ready to bake, just place them directly on a baking sheet without thawing. They’ll take slightly longer to bake but will be just as tasty. They are ready when crunchy on the outside, golden on the bottom, but still soft inside.