The Queso Suizo Project: Raclette

Guck mal! Just look at that melted cheesy goodness.

Did you know that you can buy a raclette machine at target.com? Actually, the first time I ever tried raclette was in San Diego about four months before I moved to Switzerland. Our gracious hostess (my sister's boyfriend's mom, P) and lover of all things Swiss, invited us over for a raclette dinner as a kind of farewell gesture before our big move. Unfortunately, Isaiah almost burned down the machine shop at school that evening, so he was unable to attend. Luckily, P had also extended the invitation to some of my family, so no cheese went to waste. Indeed, I owe it to P for introducing me to this yummy meal, and, thus, for my haste in convincing Isaiah to buy one my first week in Switzerland. Since we have yet to eat raclette with genuine Swiss people, like Jessica of Swisstory (for a Raclette How-To check out this post), we can't be sure we are eating it the proper Swiss way. As you'll see in the photos, we eat it two different ways. And the next day, if we have leftover cheese, we heat up the machine and make cheesy bread. YUM! To heck with Swiss tradition. We've created our own family tradition, so there.

The raclette meal I will be sharing here is the one we cooked up on V-day this past weekend. First, allow me to introduce the participants:

The Machine
(Some brand I can't remember we bought at Denner for 50 CHF. One side of the grill is for pancakes/crepes, the other is for meats and stuff.)

The Wine
(White from Valais purchased at Coop)

The Cheese
(Surchoix Raclette and Peperoni Raclette from the cheese lady at Coop. I liked the Surchoix the best, though both were yummy and buttery.)

And of course the Cornichons that you see made their way into almost every shot. I love those little guys!

So, the concept is really very simple. You put raclette cheese on the little dish and watch it melt. I believe this is the more traditional way.


After the cheese has melted to your liking you pour it over potatoes (left). You'll notice we cut our potatoes into tiny pieces because our tradition is to first fill the little dish with potatoes, put cheese on top, and then watch it melt (right). It makes for a tall stack and tight fit, but then everything comes out all warm and gooey.














Bottom line: When the smell of melting raclette is in the air, get out of my way!

5 comments

  1. Raclette cheese... check
    Potatoes (although tiny and put in the pan is against regulations!)... check
    White wine... check
    Pickles/corninchons... check

    Seems like you are only missing the pickled onions and the raclette seasoning! Nice work.

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  2. I know we're so bad!

    Do you think the seasoning is really necessary? I feel bad, like I'm ruining the cheese or something.

    Oh yeah, and although we forgot those pickled onions for this meal, we usually keep a jar in the fridge and eat them just because. We also munch on those pickled mini-corns. What else can we pickle...?

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  3. I totally know its not traditional - but I always sautay little veggies in some butter under the heat - then add the cheese and then pour it over the potatoes. Gotta get some health in there somewhere!

    I always end up with frying some extra onion slices and doing toasted bread on the top grill. I haven't ventured out to the "crepe" options on the grill.

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  4. Yeah, we haven't tried making crepes yet either, but we use that side for corn meal pancakes from scratch almost every weekend! (um... confession: although it's not photographed, we, too, sauté a mix of bell peppers, garlic, tomatoes, and onions on the stove. Then we bring to the table the bowl of potatoes and the bowl of veggies and have at it. We live for breaking tradition...)

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  5. Actually... if you look at the bottom right photo you'll see a little bit of orange bell pepper mixed in with potatoes. We know it's not Swiss, but it's so tasty!

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