Fermentation Friday: Melting in the New Year

"Fermentation Friday":  An semi-regular look at the holy fermented trinity:  beer, wine and cheese.

This year, with New Year's Eve/Day being in the middle of the work week and returning from our weekend in Philly, we hadn't given a lot of thought or effort to what we'd do for New Year's. But as we were spending our last day in Philly standing in DiBruno Brothers' Rittenhouse Square outpost with Patti asking, "What are you going to do with all of that cured meat you always buy here but never finish?" we had our answer:  Raclette.

For the uninitiated, Raclette is both a stinky and melty cheese from Alpine France/Switzerland, and a meal prepared with said cheese in which large quantities of it are melted and poured over various other foodstuffs, usually charcuterie, steamed potatoes, cornichons and steamed broccoli -- at least traditionally. It's big with the après-ski crowd and, years ago after we were invited over to a Raclette-centric gathering hosted by a work colleague who's married to a Frenchman, we were smitten. After all, it's a meal whose principal parts are melted/burnt cheese and cured meats. What could possibly be wrong with that?

Our Raclette machine

"So how do you produce all of this melty, burnt cheese?" you ask. With a Raclette machine, of course! Raclette machines come in a couple of varieties:  One, which is more traditionally French in which you have a holder where you place half a wheel of Raclette (yes, half a wheel)under a heated electrical element, where it causes the cheese to bubble and then you swivel it on its side and scrape the cheese on the plate of whatever you've chosen to pour melted cheese over; or the more conventional machine that features a flat top grill with a heating element under it, where you put little trays of your cheese, meat and stuff under an element and it melts in your little tray. The latter is much more common in the US -- easily found in a Sur la Table or similar kitchen store. I bought one for Patti at Christmas a few years ago and, while it's pretty much a single use device (though ours claims to double as a crepe maker), it's fun during the 1-2 times a year (if that) we get it out. And you don't need to feel like you have to buy half a wheel of fricking cheese!

The cheeses:  From left to right:  Swiss, American and French

But it was great for New Year's. It's fun and relaxing. It doesn't require cooking a large hunk of something, or getting multiple dishes going. In fact, cooking the meal is actually *part* of the meal. It's like fondue in that way, and makes for great fun with company, though this year it was just us.

And to make it a little geekier, we found no fewer than three types of Raclette at DiBruno Brothers -- a Swiss version, a French version and a domestic version from Vermont. Meaning we could have a Raclette taste-off!

The meats!

We paired our three cheeses with an impressive array of meats, including DiBruno Brothers sweet and hot abbruzze, hot sopressata, and Salumi's mole and sweet paprika salami. We also had the usual cornichons, steamed broccoli and steamed potatoes. And then we set about to melting.

Cheese-wise, the Swiss was our least favorite. It was just plain too stinky. Don't get me wrong, I like stinky cheese, but this was too much. The American version was tasty, but tended to not melt well, breaking like a sauce instead of becoming all gooey. The French version, on the other hand, was just right. The right sharpness, melted nicely and tasted really good when it was a little burned.

We accompanied our meal by dipping into our wine collection for a bottle of Chateauneuf du Pape that we brought back from France in 2011, and a bottle of Grand Cru Champagne we'd been saving on account'a it was New Year's.

All-in-all, it was a great way to ring in the New Year -- a fun little experiment in cheese, a light effort in terms of cleanup, and a relaxing evening. If you'd like to try Raclette yourself, I know people who have used their broiler. If you live in the DC area, I also know Cheesetique in Del Ray and Shirlington rents them out -- something like $50 for the machine and a certain amount of cheese. Or you might be able to borrow ours. After all, we don't use it that much. But we're glad we have it.

Happy New Year, everyone!

La toute ensemble!