Fall Swiss Beer Fondue

As a child, my mom used to make a fondue on special occasions. She had a black electric fondue pot that sat in the back of the cupboard and was pulled out and dusted-off when we had company over. I remember how excited I would get when choosing which colour of little two-pronged fondue fork was mine for the evening. My mom mainly made oil-based fondues, served with bite-sized chunks of meat and potatoes. It never failed that I would burn the roof of my mouth, because after waiting so patiently to cook, I couldn't wait for the food to cool before popping the deliciousness into my mouth!

Fondues originated in the French speaking parts of Switzerland. During the winter, when food and crops were sparse, farmers needed a way to use what food they had (i.e. their stale bread and leftover old cheese portions). So they used a bit of dry-white wine and melted the cheese, dipping it up with the stale crusty bread. The word fondue literally means "melted" and comes from the French verb fondre, meaning to melt.

Today, I still get excited about fondue. It's a dish that brings a light to people's eyes. I mean, who doesn't have a great fondue memory. When making fondues for company or when entertaining, I prefer to go with a cheese fondue. I think it appeals to a much wider range of dietary preferences and restrictions. There's something for everybody, especially if you choose your accompaniments well, i.e. some with gluten, some fruit, some veg, something with brine, etc.

If you are serving a fondue as a large appetizer or as a portion of your main meal, a good guideline to go by is around 200 grams of cheese per person (if grated, that's about 1 cup). My recipe below serves 4 people, so I'm basing it on about 800 grams of cheese, or about 4 cups shredded.

I prefer a traditional Swiss style fondue, which uses two main types of cheese - Gruyère, a hard yellow Swiss cheese with a slight saltiness and nutty-earth flavours and Emmental, also a yellow Swiss cheese with a medium-hard firmness and a sweet and savoury mild taste. Feel free to play around with different flavoured and textured cheese you like. You can't go wrong.

Traditional Swiss style fondues are made with a dry-white wine. My rule of thumb is always to cook with the same wine or ale that you like to drink. While the alcohol burns off during cooking, you are still left with the flavours, so use something you enjoy. For this recipe, I decided to use a wheat ale, or weiss beer as I had some leftover from our Oktoberfest celebrations, in place of the dry-white wine to add some additional fall flavour notes. Any wheat ale, saison or brown ale (nutty flavours) would go well in this fondue, as long as it has a low bitter content. If you would like to stay traditional and use wine, look for a dry white or a nice pinot noir, both would go lovely here. My rule of thumb for ratios is start with 1 cup of liquid (wine or beer) and add more to loosen the melted cheese if necessary.

In terms of accompaniments, you can use almost anything you want. Traditional fondues have torn pieces of good quality bread, cornichons, olives, sliced sausage, veggies, etc. For my platter, I wanted to keep with a local British Columbia fall harvest theme for my accompaniments, so I went with local BC Honey Crisp Apples (they are firm, crisp and slightly sweet), BC grown Coronation Grapes (a fabulous rich purple colour) and a French Country Rye Bread - a traditional dark peasant loaf - from local bakery, A Bread Affair. I also threw in a few cut-up soft pretzels that I thought added to the Oktoberfest vibe and some edible marigold flowers from my edible flower garden.

For the sake of presentation, I opted to hollow out and roast a local BC Kuri Squash, as they look a lot like bright orange pumpkins. The plus side of using a squash for the finished fondue is that it looks amazing. The down side is that the cheese becomes less "dippable" after about 30-45 minutes as the cheese cools and firms up. This wasn't a problem for us though, as the fondue disappeared extremely quickly! The next day, I scooped the flesh out of the hollow kuri squash bowl and used it in a cashew cream pasta sauce - yum. No waste.

So, go pour yourself a glass of something and get fonduing!

Enjoy,

Krista

Fall Swiss Beer Fondue

Ingredients

For the Fondue

1-1.5 cups wheat ale (+ more as needed), wine can be substituted here

1/2 onion shredded finely on a box grater

2 garlic cloves, 1 minced, 1 left whole

1/3 c heavy cream

4 cups shredded room temperature cheese, rinds removed (I used 1.5 cups Gruyère, 1.5 cups Emmental & 1 cup mozzarella)

3 tablespoons cornstarch (this assists with melting the cheese)

salt and pepper

1 teaspoon thyme leaves, fresh (+ more for garnish)

1-2 teaspoons kirsch, to taste (optional)

For the Accompaniments, bite-sized pieces of:

1/2 loaf crusty loaf or baguette

2 apples, cut into bite-size chunks

1 bunch coronation grapes

edible flowers and fresh herbs to garnish

1 kuri squash (roast ahead of time, then allow to cool to room temperature)

Method

Grate cheeses and place into a bowl. Add cornstarch, salt and pepper and thyme leaves. Mix ingredients together until cheese is coated and set bowl aside.

In a cold medium-sized saucepan, rub 1 whole garlic clove around the bottom and insides of the pan. Repeat on the insides of the kuri squash, reserving what is left of the clove to add to the fondue later. Add wheat ale, onions and minced garlic clove to pan. Turn element to medium-heat and cook until liquid is lightly simmering. Slowly add heavy cream. Bring back to a simmer on low temperature and cook for 8-10 minutes or until cream thickens and garlic and onions have broken down, releasing their flavours.

Slowly, add 1 cup of grated cheese into the hot liquid mixture and stir with a wooden spoon until melted, repeat until all cheese is added and cheese becomes warm and stringy. Take reserved garlic clove and add to pot. Simmer for 2-5 minutes until smooth and bubbling, adding more beer as necessary to thin out the fondue. One minute before finishing, add kirsch to taste.

Remove pan from heat and pour fondue into a fondue pot (then follow pot instructions for heating), or squash. Garnish with fresh thyme leaves, other herbs and flowers and salt and pepper as needed. Place squash (or pot) in the centre of a table or giant platter with accompanied dipping ingredients (bread, fruit, flowers, etc.) dispersed around.

*If using a Kuri Squash to serve, prior to making fondue:

Cut stem side top of squash off - think of it as the squash's hat. Make the hole large enough to scoop the seeds out, but small enough so that you have a good sized bowl to hold the cheese. Rub squash with 1-2 tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil and sprinkle with salt and pepper. Roast at 400 degrees until squash is soft if poked with a fork, but still maintains it's shape - about 25-30 minutes.

Recipe Notes

1. Use a cold pan when adding wheat ale otherwise the ale will foam profusely and you will need to keep adding more liquid throughout cooking process

2. If your cheese mixture breaks, don't worry. This sometimes happens when you add cold cheese to a hot liquid. Add all of the ingredients to a blender and blend, strain, add a bit more cream to the mixture and stir. Then pour fondue back into the pan and gently re-heat until smooth and bubbling.