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FOOD
Cheesy winners!
Perfect winter warming treats made with
European cheeses.
Winter is the perfect time to cook with
cheese and European cheeses are essential
ingredients in the kitchen due to their
diversity of texture and flavour. Such
cheeses are featured in many traditional family favourites
- such as gratins, tarts and pizzas - and can be used in
fondues and for sauces.
If you're looking for the perfect meal to share with
friends then Raclette is for you! While you can eat
Raclette cheese cold, it truly reveals itself when melted.
Raclette can be melted by heating the cheese either in
front of a fire or using a specially Raclette machine. As the
top layer melts, it is traditionally scraped onto potatoes,
gherkins and cured meats and you can use prepared
vegetables too. Anyone who has been skiing in the French
Alps will have seen it and probably had it.
Savoyard fondue is also a perfect cold-weather dish
and is also a popular regional Alpine dish made from a
range of cheeses such as Emmental, Comté, Beaufort or
Abondance, with added garlic and Savoy white wine. It
is usually eaten with small pieces of stale bread. Using a
fondue fork you dip the bread into the melted cheese to
taste it, taking care not to drop the bread off the end of
the fork.…
Golden moments
Vacherin du Haut-Doubs (also known as Mont d'Or), is
one of the few cheeses that you can eat with a spoon due
to its very creamy texture. Production is limited from
mid-summer until early spring due to the Montbéliarde
and Simmental cattle only producing enough milk during
the warmer months. It's at its best during September to
March and is only available during this time.
Presented in its spruce box, its rind is wrinkled like
the mountains where it was produced. It has a marked
woody aroma but whilst its smell is intense, it has a
delicate flavour with fresh, creamy notes and a pleasant
smoothness. Its creamy, melt-in-the-mouth paste can be
enjoyed at room temperature on bread or as a hot dish
in the oven. Literally translated as golden mountain, this
cheese is held in high esteem. It does pong a bit though.
Not good if that's not your thing. Fabulous if it is!
Reblochon is well-rounded creamy cheese is
exclusively made with locally-produced whole raw cow's
milk. The history of Reblochon began more than five
centuries ago when the farmers of the Aravis mountains
were subject to a milk tax to be paid to the local lords.
The farmers would wait until the tax collectors left before