I just came into this restaurant.
It's called Restaurant de Fromage,
so what I've asked is if they'll
produce eight dishes for me
of different cheeses
with different dishes.
The reason being, that a lot
of the time,
I do have to eat lots of food
just to get a taste of a region.
And I just want to show you
what this actually means.
So, first of all, I have an omelette
of potatoes
with Saint Point cheese.
Saint Point cheese
and smoked ham.
So here we go.
Delicious. Delicious, lovely, smoky
flavours even in the omelette.
Very, very mellow-tasting cheese
and some lovely smoked ham
to go with it.
Well, this looks really good.
Tarte flambee. Oh, oh!
Now we have a tartine de Morbier.
Now, a tartine is something you
normally have for breakfast
with butter on it.
But this is with Morbier cheeses
and onions and lardons.
And, again, this is...
Mm, wow!
Goes so well with this
local Jura wine,
this is chardonnay from Arbois.
The wines have a slight bit
of oxidisation
which is part of the trademark
of their wines.
I'm really loving this.
We're into dish three now.
Mm!
Well, this is Chevre chaud de Jura
a la creme.
Thinking of that Monty Python
cheese sketch.
"It's a bit runny, sir."
Right, dish number five.
This is local Morteau sausage dipped
into what's called cancoillotte,
which is like very difficult
to describe.
I've only just come across it,
but it's like aged curd cheese,
so it's full cream milk with rennet
and made with wine and garlic,
and each family
has their own cancoillotte.
Wow!
This just looks lovely.
But I am, you know, I would be so
full of enthusiasm
for this leg of chicken boned out
and stuffed with mushrooms
and Comte cheese
with a sauce of morels,
of morel mushrooms and cream
and a bit of stock.
But, you know, I'm not denying this
tastes absolutely great,
but where do we go from here?
Gosh.
Fondue.
Two types of Comte cheese in the
fondue
and a secret cheese and some
sauvignon wine...
Oh! Some new potatoes.
Even though I am a little full,
this is fab.
Phew!
And, finally, raclette, the name
of the cheese
and the name of the dish
and the name of the machinery,
I guess.
The name comes from the word
"racler",
which means to scrape.
The rather '70s-looking
brass table heater
melts the cheese right onto
the plate.
You always have it with potatoes,
with gherkins
and plenty of black pepper.
But raclette is the stuff
of skiing holidays.
And it's one of those things,
when you come off the ski slopes
in the late afternoon,
maybe you have a glass of Gluhwein
and you just think,
"We're having raclette tonight."
For me, cheese is France.
I mean, you go into any
restaurant in France
and that lovely smell of cheese,
it couldn't be anywhere else.
There's always a smell of warm
cheese,
a slightly smelly cheese
in the air.
And it's sort of synonymous
with France for me.
So actually sitting down,
I have had too much to eat,
I am a bit stuffed, to be honest.
But...
..that, I hope, is that.
