Raclette

After class on Friday a friend and I stopped at Borough Market for lunch.  There is a stand that serves Raclette, a dish from parts of Switzerland and France. Raclette is derived from the French word "racler" which means "to scrape."  Traditionally the dish is cheese, small potatoes, pickles, gherkins, dried meat, onions, mushrooms, tomatoes, peppers, salt and pepper.  The cheese is heated and scraped onto the potatoes.  It is a lot more interesting to see than the way I'm describing it.

The top of the cheese is being melted.

He scrapes off the top layer of cheese onto the potatoes.

This place uses Ogleshield cheese and serves it on potatoes, gherkins, and pickled baby onions.

 He even scrapes off the rind

My friend had the raclette and I had the best grilled cheese sandwich ever.  It is Montgomery cheddar cheese, onions, leeks, and garlic on Poilane sourdough bread.  Poilane is famous for his sourdough bread. One of our chefs suggested we visit Poilane's first bakery in Paris and tour the kitchen to see the process done all by hand and the wood-burning ovens they use.

I had to try one of these custard tarts that are traditional in Portugual.

They combine two wonderful things - custard and phyllo dough.  Delicious!