Brazilian Cheese Buns - Pão de Queijo

These are similar to the scrumptious cheese bread that you get at Rodizios or Fogo de Chao.  Soooooo good!  When I mixed up the dough, it was too "runny", so I added more of the flour, as directed....but I added it too quickly and therefore added too much, which made these a little dry and stiff.  So if you need to add extra flour, just do it a little at a time.  The dough should be about like cream puff dough.  The flavor is excellent. 

Brazilian Cheese Buns

(Pão de Queijo )

1/2 cup unsalted butter

1/4 cup water

1/4 cup milk

3/4 teaspoon table salt or 1 teaspoon kosher salt

2 cups tapioca flour or gluten-free tapioca starch

2 teaspoons minced garlic

heaping 2/3 cup grated fresh Parmesan, Romano, or aged Asiago cheese

2 large eggs, lightly beaten

1) Preheat the oven to 375°F. Grease a mini muffin pan.

2) Put the butter, water, milk, and salt in a saucepan, and heat till the butter has melted and the mixture has come to a full boil. While the mixture is heating, put 2 cups of tapioca flour into a mixing bowl.

3) Pour the boiling butter mixture over the tapioca flour, beating to combine. Beat at high speed till the mixture becomes smooth and elastic-looking; this will happen very quickly.

4) Beat the garlic and cheese into the dough till well combined.

5) Stick your finger into the dough. If it's uncomfortably hot, let it sit for a couple of minutes to cool a bit; you don't want to cook the eggs when you beat them in. If it seems hot but not burning hot, continue with the next step.

6) With the mixer going, gradually dribble in the beaten eggs, beating till well combined and smooth.

7) Fill the mini muffin pan - each can be filled to the top.*

8) Bake the rolls for about 20 minutes, till they have a freckled appearance (from the browning cheese), and they're beginning to color a bit. Remove them from the oven, and serve hot.

Yield: 18 to 20 buns.

*The original recipe said to use a cookie scoop to drop the dough in balls about the size of a golf ball  onto a greased cookie sheet.  So you can do that instead, if you don't want to use a mini muffin pan.
*A note from the website:
We’ve found that tapioca starch/flour varies in its absorption capabilities. If you’re gotten this far and the batter is thinner, more like cake or pancake batter, beat in additional tapioca flour/starch till it’s thick enough to hold its shape when you scoop some onto a baking sheet. It should be the approximate consistency of cream puff batter: when you plop it onto the pan, it should settle slightly, but not spread into a puddle.

Any left overs can be warmed in the microwave before serving.

Recipe from kingarthurflour.com