La Tartiflette

Several years ago, we went en famille, to stay in a chalet belonging to my worldly wise and successful Brother in Law, in St Gervaise, within view of Mont Blanc.  He loves skiing .  We just loved going to France and the Mountains and the snow.

While we were there, we attended a cultural event, involving a kind of Haute Savoie morris dancing, a visiting display of ballet from a school in Bulgaria and (included in the price) La Tartiflette, the traditional dish of the Haute Savoie.  While we were waiting for the main event, sipping from glasses of very nice local wine, we watched through the window as the chef and his lovely assistant (dressed in local traditional costume) circled a gigantic saute pan outside throwing in gargantuan quantities of potatoes, cheese, lardons, garlic and Reblochon – the local cheese which is like a half Camembert in size, shape and texture.  They stirred this mixture with spoons a yard long and every so often they poured in a bottle or five of the local wine.  And when I say gigantic, I mean about the size of our sitting room.  It was as big as a small swimming pool.  And the gargantuan bit – they were trotting round and round this thing , scooping up whole cheeses from a side table and throwing them in, for at least ten minutes.  It ended up as a kind of cheesy bacon and potato dish and very nice it was too.

During the week that we were there, we also went to the local restaurant and had their Haute version of tartiflette, which came on a sizzling dish and had a lot of cream in it.  And then on our last day, we found a lovely cheese shop where we bought some reblochon which had the recipe for tratiflette on the wrapping – in French, naturally.

See –

Over the years we have attempted to make the recipe at home, guessing at the bits we couldn’t understand and remembering what we’d seen (reblochon is available in supermarkets these days and camembert or brie make perfectly acceptable alternatives) and it’s only tonight that it occurred to me to use google translate and find out what it really says.

La Tartiflette

Proportion; 200-300g per person. Take: 1kg potatoes, boiled, fried or boiled, cut into small pieces. 1 Reblochon, 20cl creme fraiche, salt, pepper, garlic and bacon.

SEVERAL times alternating a layer of potatoes, a layer of Reblochon cheese slices, sprinkled with garlic, salt, pepper every time.

Put a hot oven (7-8) 25 to 30 minutes.   Pour the creme fraiche with  10 minutes at the end of cooking. Serve hot, accompanied possibly sausage smoke countries.

Anyway, we had it last night, using up leftover brie and bacon and it was very nice  though I haven’t been able to find the sausage smoke countries to accompany.  And tonight we’ll have chicken and leek pie.

The tale of a long, stormy life

and the last of the sun from the beginning of the year.