Cheese Please. . .

It is still brutally cold here, and we are still not happy about it. We have discovered however, that wine chills more quickly outside than in the refrigerator.  It is a stretch but you have to find those silver linings where you can.

Luckily, we found another meal to warm us up on the inside. Sue claims that she has never met a cheese she didn’t like; so we used three for good measure . . . fondue for you?

We went overboard selecting the prettiest and most colorful vegetables. Case in point, there were four different colors of cauliflower, but the purple begged to come home with Meg.  Instead of a salad we chose an array of raw vegetables, which is a great way to provide everyone with their favorites. The contrast with the warm gooey fondue was refreshing.

The colors of the rainbow.

The thing about fondue is that it can be as simple as bread and cheese or as lavish as you choose to make it. Really, a perfect party food or an intimate dinner for two. Paired with a great wine there is nothing better on a cold night!

To accompany the fondue. 

Cheese Please . . .

Meg and Sue’s Three Cheese Fondue
Total Time:   1 hour
Prep:  40 min 
Level:  Easy
Yield:  4 servings

Ingredients
8 ounces grated Fontina
8 ounces grated Gruyere
2 ounces crumbled American Blue Cheese
6 teaspoons cornstarch
 2 cups dry white wine (we used Vinho Verde)
Freshly ground black pepper and salt to taste
1 clove of garlic mashed
1 Tbsp. olive oil
1 Tbsp. fresh thyme for garnish
Roasted small crimini and white mushrooms, steamed broccoli and cauliflower (purple) florets, small purple, white and red potatoes, grilled chicken sausages (your favorite), toasted 1 inch cubes of French and whole grain baguettes

Directions
Toss the Fontina, Gruyere, and blue cheese with the cornstarch in a medium bowl to coat.   Saute the sausages in olive oil until brown. Remove from pan, add the garlic clove and sauté on low for about a minute.  Pour the wine into the same saucepan and bring to a boil. Decrease the heat to medium.  Remove the garlic clove. With a wooden spoon, stir in the cheese mixture about a cup at a time.  Continue stirring until the cheese is completely melted and the fondue bubbles, about 5 minutes. We used an immersion blender to fully incorporate the blue cheese.  Season the fondue with salt and pepper to taste.

Transfer the cheese mixture to a fondue pot and sprinkle the fresh thyme on top.  Set the pot over a candle or a canned heat burner. Serve with bread and vegetables.

The Fondue dippers!

Dig in!

Tupungato from Argentina to go with the fondue.

Winter Coffee

Total Time:   10 min
Prep:  10 min 
Level:  Easy
Yield:  2 servings

Ingredients
4 shots espresso  (about 1 cup)
1/3  cup heavy cream plus 2 tablespoons heavy cream divided
1/2 cup Kahlua liqueur, divided
1 tsp powdered sugar
1 dash of vanilla
Cocoa powder, for sprinkling

Directions
Using an electric mixer, whip the cream, sugar and vanilla in a small bowl until hard peaks form. 
Add ¼ cup Kahlua and 1 tablespoon of cream to each glass and stir to combine. Pour espresso into glasses and top with whipped cream and dust with cocoa. Sit back and enjoy.

Winter warm up!

Our biased and unsolicited opinions:

We could blame this recipe on the weather but we really wanted cheese and we loved every single bite! We liked the edge that the blue cheese added to the mix.

We strongly recommend the raw vegetables to provide a fresh counterpoint to the fondue.

Although we used a white wine in the fondue, we wanted a red with the meal. We discussed a Zinfandel and a Rioja, but this Tupungato won out. It is a blend of Cabernet Sauvignon, Malbec and Merlot from Argentina. It was dry with rich flavors of blackberry and strawberry and complimented the meal very well. 

Our “Winter Coffee” is fuel for Sue’s twenty-mile-freezing-cold drive home. Meg thinks she is a sissy, but she willingly accommodated her nonetheless.  It’s good even if you don’t have to drive twenty miles in the freezing cold. Next time, we won’t add the cream to the liqueur, as it diluted the espresso. We might also add a touch of cinnamon or cayenne. See, we even change things up on ourselves.

Stay warm wherever you are and hope for an early spring. That’s what we are doing.