French · Brittany · main

Galette de Sarrasin Complète

Galette de Sarrasin Complète reads umami 6.3, richness 6.1 and salinity 5.4 on Palate's 0–10 flavor X-ray — a French · Brittany main, about 2 hr 14 min. Measured from the recipe itself: ingredients and technique.

The flavor X-ray — six axes, 0–10

• Umami & Savory — 7.0 / 10
• Sweet & Fruity — 1.3 / 10
• Sour & Bright — 0.6 / 10
• Bitter & Earthy — 1.6 / 10
• Rich & Fat — 7.1 / 10
• Aromatic & Spice — 1.4 / 10

The measured notes (of 18)

Umami 6.3 · Richness 6.1 · Salinity 5.4 · Nutty 3.4 · Funk & Ferment 1.9 · Warm Spice 1.4 · Sweetness 1.3 · Smoke 1.3 · Earthy 1.3 · Bitterness 0.6 · Sourness 0.6 · Heat 0.6

What's in it (10)

• buckwheat flour — 300 g
• cold water — 600 g
• celtic sea salt — 10 g
• egg — 50 g
• butter — 100 g
• eggs — 400 g
• ham cooked — 320 g
• emmenthaler cheese — 200 g
• peanut oil — 14 g
• freshly ground black pepper — 3 g

Time & effort: about 2 hr 14 min (14 min active) · effort: medium

Nutrition (per 100 g, engine-estimated): 129.1 kcal, 9.9 g protein, 9.4 g fat, 0.6 g carbs

Dietary: Contains meat · Contains dairy · Contains egg — engine-derived; double-check anything allergy-critical.

How it's cooked (8 steps)

1. Buckwheat is not wheat and not a grass at all; it came to Brittany in the late Middle Ages because it would grow on poor acid soil where wheat would not, and the galette is the direct result. Buy real farine de blé noir, ideally stone-ground and from Brittany — the pallid industrial stuff makes a galette that tastes of nothing.
2. Put the buckwheat flour and the salt in a bowl, make a well and pour in about a third of the water. Beat it hard with a whisk or your hand for a good 5 minutes: you are aerating it as much as mixing it, and Breton crêpières will tell you the batter should be lifted and slapped until it ribbons. Beat in the rest of the water and the single egg until it is the consistency of thin cream.
3. Cover and rest the batter at least 2 hours at room temperature, and preferably overnight in the fridge. Buckwheat has no gluten to relax, but the starch needs time to hydrate, and an unrested batter tears in the pan and tastes chalky.
4. Heat a heavy flat pan or crêpe pan until a drop of water skitters and vanishes, around 220°C. Wipe it with an oiled cloth — a film, not a pool.
5. Pour a small ladle of batter into the centre and spread it immediately into a thin disc, with a wooden rake if you own one or by tilting and swirling the pan. Cook 90 seconds, until the edges lift and the underside is spotted brown, then flip.
6. Brush the cooked side with melted salted butter. Lay a slice of ham on, scatter a handful of Emmental, and crack an egg into the middle. Fold the four sides in to make a square, leaving the yolk showing. Cook 2 to 3 minutes more, until the white has just set and the yolk is still liquid — the yolk is the sauce, and a hard yolk is a wasted galette.
7. Slide it out, grind pepper over, and eat it at once with a bowl of cold dry cider. The first galette of any batch is always a sacrifice to the pan; the second will be right.
8. One rule from the crêperies: sweet crêpes are made with wheat and butter, savoury galettes with buckwheat. Mixing the two is the mark of somebody who learned this outside Brittany.

Dishes with a similar flavor shape

• Cotoletta alla Petroniana — Italian · Emilia-Romagna
• Soufflé au Fromage — French
• Gougères Bourguignonnes — French · Burgundy
• Croque Monsieur — French
• Cacio e Pepe with Crispy Prosciutto — Italian

Keep reading: what umami, richness, salinity mean in the flavor lexicon · the world's cuisines, by flavor.

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Every number above is Palate's engine-measured estimate, computed from this recipe's ingredients and techniques — not human-tasted ratings or reviews.