Haute Savoie and Tartiflette

Many moons ago I was lucky enough to spend almost five years of my life living in the French Alps.  As a child I loved skiing.  As a young adult I loved snowboarding.  This dream bought me all the way to the Haute Savoie a region in the French Alps right near the Italian and Swiss borders, this place is a slice of heaven.

The local cuisine is heavily infiltrated with Cheese, Potato and some bacon.  A few other ingredients, but not many really.  Whilst working in a small village deep in the alps in an even smaller and very left of center bar/pizzeria I discovered Tartiflette.  I discovered a thing or two else, but I'll save them for further posts.

Today I'll tell you how Siegfred the owner of the bar had once been a champion mono skier.  That's right a champion on the mono ski.  The mono ski was cool in the haute 80's, well so I have been told.  Siegfred had decided to make his bar into a mono ski museum.  There were mono skis hanging from the walls and big pictures of him and his mates doing gnarly tricks on the mono skis back in the day.  Th place certainly didn't lack character nor did it lack characters.

The menu mostly had pizzas and some hamburgers, but it also had Tartiflette.  The menu didn't change periodically and probably still hasn't today.

Tartiflette was always made in an oval ceramic dish for one, we cooked it in the hot pizza over and it was delicious.  Made with a stinky French cheese known as Reblechon melted on top.  This stuff smells like toe jam, but the flavour is so good.  The stinkier the cheese the better in my opinion. Hmm I can taste it already, bacon, onions and potatoes swimming in cream with melted stinky cheese on top.  Just perfect for those freezing cold winter nights.

Tartiflette

2 x boiled potatos, peeled and sliced or diced 1cm thick

200gr Bacon sliced or Lardon cubes if you can get them

1/2 - 1 small onion, sliced into rings

splash of dry white wine

200 - 300 ml cream

thickly sliced Reblechon Cheese (or you can simply cut the cheese round in half and place the 2 halves on top)

In a fry pan on med to high heat, sweat the onions adding the bacon.  When they are just about done add a healthy slosh of white wine and allow it to reduce.

Throw in the potato slices and toss around a couple of times to mix the ingredients together.  Be careful not to break up the potatoes.  Then dump the contents of the fry pan into your ceramic dish, filling it to about 1.5cm below the top.

Pour cream over the potato, onion and bacon until the cream reaches just below the top of potato layer (we don't need them to be swimming).

Lay the slices of Reblechon over the top and place in a hot over 350 deg Celsius (or there a bouts) for about 5 minutes of until the cheese is melted and slightly browning and the cream is bubbling.

Serve with salad on the side.  Bon Appetite