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Fondue 1 - Fondue 2 - Bagna Cauda - Wine Choice 4 1/2 cups Swiss cheese ¼ tsp. pepper 1 ¼ tbsp. cornstarch 1 clove garlic, chopped 1 1/4 cup white wine 2 tbsp. lemon juice French bread cut into cubes
Coat cheese with cornstarch. Combine garlic and wine in a pan and heat until it begins to bubble but not boil. Stir in lemon juice and pepper. Add cheese slowly, stirring constantly with a wooden spoon. Keep on low heat and stir until cheese melts. Remove to fondue dish and keep warm over low heat. Dip cubes of bread in fondue. If fondue thickens, stir in more heated wine until desired consistency. Serves 4-6 CHOCOLATE PEANUT BUTTER FONDUE12 oz. semisweet chocolate ½ cup peanut butter
Melt chocolate and stir in peanut butter. Stir until smooth and well blended. Place in fondue dish and keep warm. Marshmallows, strawberries, bananas and orange slices may be dipped in fondue or arrange a variety of fruit and cubed pound cake on a platter for dipping. Makes approx. 1 1/3 cups BAGNA CAUDA (HOT BATH)½ cup olive oil 1 stick butter 5 garlic cloves, finely chopped 7 anchovy fillets, chopped or mashed Dash of pepper
Heat the oil and butter in a double boiler. In another pan cook the garlic in some oil until it is soft. Add the anchovy fillets and cook until the fish dissolves into a paste, about 5 minutes. Add everything to the pan of oil and butter.
This was a favorite in my house, particularly on New Year’s Day. The Bagna Cauda is kept hot in the middle of the table. Dip celery, artichokes, endive, pepper, zucchini, squash, cauliflower, broccoli or cubes of French bread into the mixture. Fondue 1 - Fondue 2 - Bagna Cauda - Wine Choice
Well, I have to admit it: I had no idea what to serve with these dishes. After grumbling under my breath for a bit, I sat down to figure it out. I thought about the tastes of the dishes, but kept thinking that they would overpower anything I put with them. Still, these are things people serve regularly in some places; there had to be wine to go with them. So I surfed the Internet to see what other people did. To begin with, Bagna Cauda is an Italian item I was familiar with from Karen's family. Literally, it means "hot bath" and is used as a dipping sauce for all sorts of things. Italians have a wine for everything, and searching the Net brought me up against a couple. In Piedmont they seem to think Barbera: a tangy red wine that will help cut through to your palate. Sometimes they will substitute a Dolcetto, but that seems too light. We like to mention American wines here, and finding a good American Barbera would have been tough a few years back, but thanks to the development of American tastes California winemakers have now produced several. I decided to go for a Sebastiani Barbera Sonoma Valley Appellation Selection 2000. If you wish a white, I would look for a dry one, so you can take a different route entirely and go with an Italian Asti Spumante. The Cheese Fondue had me pondering. My searches on the Net called a dry Swiss wine I had never heard of traditional, but no one here in the United States was going to find that. As I poked around, I saw one of those all-purpose, food-friendly whites being mentioned more and more: California or New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc. That sounded right and easily available. If you can find it, the Waterbrook Sauvignon Blanc Columbia Valley 2002 is a great value, but very little was made. I decided on the Beringer Sauvignon Blanc Napa Valley Appellation Collection 2002. By now I had warmed up, and the Chocolate Fondue gave me less trouble than I had thought. Chocolate always suggests red wine; that's why some tasting rooms have little chocolates to give you with the desert wines at the end of the tasting. I decided on a red Zinfandel, but a Cabernet or a Port style wine would go well. Down under the stairs I have a bottle from a local New Jersey winery, Alba Vineyard; I think the port's time has come. That leaves one nightmare scenario: the big party where you have all three of these available on tables and people circulating. Scratching my head, I tried to figure out a way to control that and couldn't, which was the right way to think. At a gathering like that, people will be circulating, picking at this, trying that -- but you will probably also have several different wines open. The guests will have what they have in the glass. So let them choose. Place a little placard, perhaps, with each dish suggesting what they might try with it. Sit back and enjoy. |
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Last modified: August 07, 2007 |
