Autumn in France means mountains of melting cheese. I love the cheese. The traditional dish? Not particularly.
Autumn has arrived, which means French supermarkets are once again filling up with raclette cheese.
Entire displays of it.
Plain raclette. Smoked raclette. Raclette with pepper. Raclette with various herbs and other additions.
And, of course, the inevitable equipment for making raclette at home.
For anyone unfamiliar with the dish, traditional French raclette is essentially a celebration of melted cheese poured over boiled potatoes, accompanied by cured meats, cornichons and other things that make you feel slightly less guilty about eating enormous quantities of cheese.
The French love it.
I don't.
Which is rather strange, because I absolutely love raclette cheese itself.
I enjoy its flavour, its texture, and especially the way it melts.
I just prefer to use it differently.
My favourite way: inside an oatmeal pancake
I've already written about one of my favourite breakfasts: a sort of pancake-omelette made from eggs and oatmeal.
It's simple.
Mix oats with eggs, cook the mixture in a frying pan, and let it develop into something halfway between an omelette and a thick pancake.
Then, just before it's ready, I add slices of raclette cheese.
Fold the pancake in half.
Leave it in the pan for another minute or two.
The cheese melts beautifully inside.
And here's the part that might upset some traditionalists.
I serve it with berry jam.
Yes, melted raclette cheese, eggs, oatmeal and sweet jam.
It's wonderful.
The saltiness and richness of the cheese work surprisingly well with the fruit.
Much more interesting to me than another plate of boiled potatoes.
Raclette in my coffee? Absolutely.
There's also a Finnish culinary tradition involving cheese and coffee.
The traditional Finnish kaffeost uses a particular cheese called leipäjuusto, which is served in hot coffee.
I rather like the general idea.
I enjoy drinking coffee with cheese anyway, sometimes simply eating a piece alongside it.
And I've discovered that raclette can be quite enjoyable this way too.
Sometimes I eat it with coffee or tea.
Sometimes I put a little directly into the hot drink and let it soften.
It isn't the traditional Finnish preparation, obviously. Raclette behaves differently from leipäjuusto.
But I enjoy it.
And then there's soup.
A little raclette melted over a bowl of hot soup can be excellent.
Or simply a slice of the cheese with bread and butter.
Nothing complicated.
Perhaps I just don't like being told how to eat cheese
The funny thing is that I use raclette for many of the same reasons people love the traditional dish.
It melts beautifully.
It's rich.
It's satisfying.
It works with simple ingredients.
I just don't particularly enjoy the classic combination of melted cheese, potatoes, charcuterie and cornichons.
Give me that same cheese inside an oatmeal pancake with berry jam, and I'm perfectly happy.
Or alongside a cup of strong coffee.
Or melted into something completely different.
Maybe that's why I enjoy cooking so much.
A product doesn't have to be limited to the dish that made it famous.
And sometimes the best way to appreciate a traditional ingredient is to completely ignore the tradition.
I love raclette. Just not necessarily raclette.
For another simple pairing of contrasting flavours, see My Favourite Two-Ingredient Breton Dessert.