Years ago, someone sent me the recipe for the traditional Welsh rarebit. This is my variation utilizing items from closer to home. It will still taste excellent if you substitute milk for the beer if you don’t like it. Serve over English muffins or toast.
| Prep Time: | 10 mins |
| Cook Time: | 10 mins |
| Total Time: | 20 mins |
| Servings: | 6 |
| Yield: | 2 cups |
Ingredients
- ¼ cup butter
- ¼ cup all-purpose flour
- ½ teaspoon salt
- ¼ teaspoon pepper
- ¼ teaspoon dry mustard
- ¼ teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
- 2 drops hot pepper sauce (such as Tabasco®)
- 1 cup whole milk
- ½ cup beer
- ½ pound Cheddar cheese, shredded
Instructions
- Melt butter in a saucepan over low heat. Stir in flour, salt, pepper, mustard, Worcestershire sauce, and hot pepper sauce. Cook and stir until smooth and bubbly, about 5 minutes.
- Remove the saucepan from the heat. Gradually stir in milk, then return to heat and stir continuously until mixture comes to a boil. Slowly pour in beer; cook and stir for 1 minute. Melt Cheddar cheese into mixture in small portions until completely incorporated.
Nutrition Facts
| Calories | 270 kcal |
| Carbohydrate | 7 g |
| Cholesterol | 63 mg |
| Dietary Fiber | 0 g |
| Protein | 12 g |
| Saturated Fat | 13 g |
| Sodium | 505 mg |
| Sugars | 2 g |
| Fat | 21 g |
| Unsaturated Fat | 0 g |
Reviews
yes I added more hot sauce to spice things up
This is fantastic. I have made this many times and never used the beer, but milk works fine. This is great over toast just by itself. It’s also great for veggies like broccoli or anytime you need a cheese sauce. My favorite way to use this though, is for making Horseshoe/Ponyshoes which is the hamburger patty on toasted bread topped with french fries, sometimes carmelized onions depending on my mood, and then topped with this cheese sauce. You do want to use a good quality sharp or even extra sharp cheese with a lot of flavor because that makes this. (Meaning don’t skimp out and try store brand generic cheese that has more color than taste) Delicious!!!
I like the fact that the cheese isn’t added until the very last. It makes so much more sense than adding it right at the beginning into the roux, as I’ve seen with other recipes. Will make this frequently, thanks!
This is a quick, easy, delicious recipe! But I doubled the dry mustard, as the recipe sounded a bit bland. I use a larger amount of pepper; I have stage 4 kidney disease , and cheddar is the cheese allowed on my dietary restriction, but I increase the pepper. I might suggest, for a prettier sauce, using white pepper. I toasted rye bread to serve with this delightful sauce!
Classic recipe with no fussy ingredients or technique. Big tip! Use Pepperidge Farm Hearty White bread for the toast or English Muffins.
Awesome! I added a tbs of sherry to the rarebit sauce and then mounded crab meat on toasted english muffins topped that with the welsh rarebit sauce and broiled them until lightly browned. Heavenly!
Great recipe my dad used to make this dish when I was a kid I loved it to make it the most flavourful use old or extra old cheddar you won’t be disappointed I increased the amount of cheese to 3/4 of a lb
This is definitely not the Welsh rarebit my dad made every Sunday morning. He used beer, sharp cheddar, Dijon mustard, and it was served over toast with sliced tomatoes and bacon. I grew up on that wonderful flavorful treat.
I love Welsh rarebit and this is a good basic recipe. But be sure to use sharp cheddar and kick up the amount of Worcestershire sauce and dry mustard. I also add chopped onion to my sauce and serve over bread/muffin with bacon and sliced tomato.
the word ‘rarebit’ means people don’t get the joke……Welsh Rabbit is a inside joke, meaning that the hunter didn’t get a rabbit so his wife had to substitute melted cheese.
I made it as listed with beer (Yeungling) and forgot the hot sauce. Was just as I remembered growing up. I served it over a piece of toast with a couple of slices of canadian bacon and a tomato slice. I think the beer makes the taste. I have seen others use non-alcoholic beer and will try that next time. Thanks for the recipe – it was very good and enjoyed by all!!
This is a classic recipe. I enjoy the homey taste. I have missed having this, but now I can make my own at home.
oh I love this stuff the only thing that bits it’s sooooo Ritch you can only eat so much at a time but it’s addictive none the less
Easy and fabulous taste
WAYYY TO MUCH LIQUID. You’d be better off melting shredded cheese on toast and drinking a stout if you want even a semblance of what this is supposed to be.
We do something very similar, but during tomato season, we add a slice of vine ripe tomato to the toast before adding the sauce, the broil.
This recipe was wonderful! I probably added a little more hot sauce but it didn’t make it too spicy. Also used really good sharp cheddar cheese for this. I used Kerigold sharp cheddar. Paired this with toasted baguette, various raw vegetables. Devious.
Not too bad of a recipe, but it definitely needs more of an Umami kick – that is what the Worcestershire sauce provides. I used 1/4 cup – it could probably use just a tad more than that. Also, the spice level could be a little higher – I do like “the spicy”, so next time I will kick it up a bit more as well.
It needs about 10 teaspoons of worster sauce and heaps more mustard. It was still very bland and spongy. I wouldn’t make it again.
Bland is an understatement and I added more mustard, worschestire and hot sauce. Needs “something” not sure what. EASY to make though. Not the BEST I’ve had though.
Great little snack